Stick Me With a Fork! I'm Done!

I'm done! After bursting into tears four times today, I finally realized that there is no way for me to feasibly complete all the sewing, cooking, baking, crafting, shopping, etc. that still "needs" to be completed by Christmas Eve. I'm so wore out from lack of sleep that my thoughts aren't coherent. I'm also waaaay to crabby.

There are two pairs of lounge pants that I'm going to put elastic waistbands in tomorrow, but the other sewing projects will be done in January. We didn't have much money to spend on presents this Christmas, so I was trying to make a lot of clothes for the kids. Between all the kids, there were 93 articles of clothing completed. There are still zippers to put in two dresses, two zippers to put into sweatshirts, three shirts for Katie that are too complicated for my overwrought brain to handle, pajamas for Mike, and a skirt and pajama set for Amy that will just have to wait.

I'm not heading to the store to pick up a few $5 gifts to even out the number of presents between the 7 kids. The checkbook can't handle any more purchases. I'm not shopping for birthday presents for the two boys until after Christmas. Maybe, I'll pick up some good deals.

Paige and Allie and I mixed up gingerbread cookie dough today. Tomorrow afternoon, we'll bake and decorate the cookies. The two girls are giving their siblings white chocolate covered pretzel rods, decorated with sprinkles for Christmas. While the cookies are baking, we will make the pretzels and package them.

Our home is reasonable clean. The kids did a great job on the playroom and their bedrooms today. Amy and I did a good clean a wax session on the main living areas. If I send the kids outside to play every afternoon, the house will be in okay shape for Christmas.

The idea of doing Christmas crafts with the kids fills me with dread. I don't want to dig out all the supplies, do the projects, and clean up the messes. It might be a better idea to do winter crafts during the doldrums of January.

This evening the children wanted to walk through the Christmas lights downtown and visit Santa. We all piled into the van. Once in the parking garage, we realized that Paige and Allie didn't have gloves. We have lots of fresh snow and lots of wind, so the walk was scraped. Madelyn, Paige, and Allie sat on Santa's lap and had their pictures taken. The older kids refused. We looked at some art exhibits in the warming area and listened to some karaoke singing, then headed back home. The man inside the Santa suit is my children's music teacher. He did a really wonderful job. My youngest two girl's didn't recognize him.