This
past week was a blur. With so much I have to do, instead of chipping away at
it, I spent too much time watching TV, napping and basically wandering around
my house in a daze. I know that it’s mostly from stress, but I really am
exhausted and ache from my head to my toes. Making it hard to get motivated.
Somehow I will get things done – I only have eight more Christmas cards to
address. Let’s see, already mailed 46 or 48 of them. I have the last batch of
Christmas cookies baked. I have half of the cut-outs decorated, so am not going
to worry about when I finish the rest of them. Almost all of the presents are
purchased, now I just need to wrap them. Oh, and we did get the tree decorated yesterday.
Every
year, I ask myself why we put ourselves through all of this. Part of it is my
husband. When I try to convince him each year that we need to cut back, he
proclaims, “Christmas is my holiday and you’re not going to take that away from
me.” To which I want to say, “Have at ‘er. Just coz you want to go nuts, doesn’t
mean I have to.” Instead, this one time a year, I am the supportive wife and
let him have his way.
So
what about my goals?
1) Finish writing my current novel, “The
Big House”. I only wrote one
chapter, 1,379 words this week. A far cry from the average I need to finish my
rough draft by the end of the year.
2) Ready “Where the Sky Meets the Sand”
for publication. I still haven’t received the first round of edits from my
publisher. I emailed them on Wednesday, I think, and heard back that I should
get those edits by the end of the week, which didn’t happen. I’m trying not to
stress about it. I have enough other things to do anyway. Wouldn’t it be better
to wait until the relaxed days following January 1 to start re-reading the
manuscript? But I am anxious to get the book ready for publication. My
publisher originally set a release date for some time in April. And I suppose,
since I am going to be in Africa the first two weeks of April, we might as well
wait to release it towards the end of the month. I still just want it back in
my hands. It also makes me nervous that my publisher hasn’t kept up their end
of the deal on this. I know it is minor, but is it a warning sign?
3) Continue posting to my other blog,
“The Dino Chronicles” three times a week. It helps that I set myself up with the topics
for all the posts for the month.
4) Finalize the next trip for my
daughter’s nonprofit, Tumaini Volunteers. As much as we need to do on this, we haven’t
worked on it this week. Life has just gotten in the way. Weather hasn’t helped.
This Friday, no matter what, my daughter and I are going to work on things. I’m
also meeting with our treasurer as she has not been able to balance the November
income and expense report. And somehow she thinks it’s my fault. I don’t know
why she blames me, but I need to appease her.
5) Get my body in shape. Seriously?
Do I not realize what this month is all about? There couldn’t be more junk food
in my house right now.
Last year's cut-outs. I took a picture of this year's, but haven't looked at it yet.
These cookies look just as good.