Sunday, December 18, 2005

The Crunch

The crunch is on!

Had a holiday gathering with Mr. Merci's side of the family today. It turned out to be a nice, relaxing day! It was a simple affair, with the obligatory excess of desserts. We wisely declined the offer to bring some of the leftovers home.

I have a very busy week ahead, both at work and at home. The extra dash of holiday spirit should make it tolerable. Wish I had saved some time off for the week between Christmas and New Year, but it wasn't to be. Oh well, new vacation and personal days will be added in January, so I can't complain. We're thinking of a long weekend away sometime this winter, but it's still a bit tentative right now.

I still have a bit of baking to do, and I haven't even thought about wrapping a gift. Fortunately, Mr. Merci and I are not doing much in the way of gifts for each other, and we've agreed that there will be no more than one candy item in each stocking this year! I think I'll check my supply of gift bags for everyone else's gifts. As I've mentioned before, I'm into an uncomplicated holiday this year!

I was able to do most of my holiday shopping on Saturday. We managed to navigate the crowds pretty well. We had a nice lunch at Applebee's with no wait! I had a very tasty cosmopolitan with lunch (very rare for me), since this was by way of being a holiday celebration for us. I highly recommend this as a shopping strategy, since I was Absolutely unaffected by stress for the rest of the afternoon.

How about the rest of you? How are you coping with this crazy season? Is it mostly pain or mostly pleasure for you? How do you spend the 25th? Most places of business are closed, so even if you do not celebrate Christmas, it would be interesting to hear about how you spend the day!

7 comments:

Zelda Parker said...

I'm with you uncomplicated is the theme. Baking cookies is the hardest thing I've done. Most of my shopping was done before Thanksgiving. There is no tree at Bubba and Eula Mae's this year and that is OK. I don't miss it, suprisingly. See you at the office where Paxie wants to do something fun on Friday.....

Virginia Gal said...

Christmas isn't our holiday so as a family we pretty much veg around the house.
This year, my mom and I are going out to Tampa to visit with my aunt's family - it should be fun, I was thinking of buying cookie dough beforehand and all us girl cousins could do that, make cookies.

Pax Romano said...

I'm going with VG and her mom to Tampa! Zelda, you need to come to the Villa and take care of Whatshisname!

Merci said...

No, Pax, I'm going to Tampa! No travel this year has made Jane a pitifully dull girl.

Really, VG, that sounds like just as much fun as anything I will do for the holiday, if not more!

Merci said...

And Zelda, our tree is up. I'm calling it a Beary-Go-Round tree. It has bears stuffed into the branches, and they circle around the bottom. I added a star, candy canes, and some crocheted snowflake ornaments my Mom made decades ago. And that's it. Couldn't bring myself to put up all of those individual ornaments this year, just to take them down again on Little Christmas.

Tony said...

shopping is done... I even went to the MAUL on Slaughterday.

I am broke and have nil to show for it, but dammit.... I am done!

:-)

Merci said...

Done is good! I think I'm done too, but I'm scatterbrained, so I might remember something on Christmas Eve. Or later.