12 for 12

My thoughts have been rather scattered lately.  My ADD is in overdrive and with the holiday fast approaching, this is not a good thing.  So today I've decided I'd give you a taste of what goes on in my head.  In honor of 12/12, here are 12 things that have been on my mind.

12.  Why is my house so hot in the daytime?  I'm talking like Jamaica hot.  If we turn the heat down then we are too cold later in the day.  It could just be me but I'm too young to be getting hot flashes.

11.  How did we get so much Christmas stuff?  It seems like Hubby just keeps bringing more and more of it up from the basement.  I have no idea how we have accumulated so much . . . well . . . Christmas crap.  Its festive and I love it.  Its just that there isn't room in our tiny townhouse for it all.

10.  Why is it that every time some little bitty thing goes wrong at our house in the next town over that we are renting out . . . anyway, why do they call property management every time?  Instead of checking the fuses, they just call and say that the indoor garage opener isn't working.  Fine.  Check the fuse and if that's not it then DEAL.  You still have two garage door openers and the keypad on the garage.  Its a one car garage.  Do you really need that many ways to access it?  I swear when I agreed to give these very young boys a chance, I should have realized they were spoiled rotten.  If you asked me right now if I would renew their lease in 2012, the answer would be NO!

9.  I think we may be a mite-free home.  They seem to be gone.  Fingers crossed.  Knock on wood.

8.  I am getting very restless at my job.  I don't know why.  Its not hard.  Its just annoying.  I can't imagine having the commitment of a career and working full-time, but I feel like I want more.  I really should get into this writing a book thing that I keep thinking about.  What harm would it do?  Maybe after the holidays.

7.  My daughter is going to college.  My daughter is going to college.  My daughter is going to college.  Maybe if I say it enough times, I will be ok with it.  She has gotten into the College Down the Street.  She even made it into their honors program.  I know that she will get into others and I am not looking forward to having to help her make this decision.  Choices like which Christmas gift to buy are hard for her because of her OCD.  I can't begin to imagine the drama this decision is going to come with.

6.  Am I blogging just for my own mental health or does reading my blog actually keep people informed on my life and maybe even help them with their problems?  (If nothing else by showing them that we all have problems.)  This blog has quite a few followers but I haven't gotten a new one in quite some time and my other blog http://www.myliteraryopinions.blogspot.com/ only has 5 followers.  It gets more hits than that but only 5 followers is kind of a bummer.  I wonder if I should keep them going?

5.  What am I going to mail my Grandmother's Christmas gift to her in.  I have it wrapped and ready to go in a shirt box.  A typical shirt box.  I wanted to send it Priority Mail so I got one of their mailing boxes.  The one referred to as a shirt box.  The only problem is their shirtbox is about 3/4 of an inch shorter than my shirt box.  Come on people.  A shirt box should be a shirt box.  When will the world get its act together and have uniform standard sizes?

4.  What else can I get my daughter for Christmas?  I have some gifts and some ideas but need more.  If you come up with any, you can comment on this blog.  I just won't post your comment so she doesn't see it.  What would you want if you were a 17 1/2 year old girl?

3.  How come if according to the movie "Fred Claus" when Santa becomes a saint, he and his whole family stop aging and freeze at the age they are at but then in the movie "The Santa Clause 3" he and his wife have a baby how could that happen according to the rules of Santa from "Fred Claus"?  Hubby says they are just movies but I am thinking this is an important thing to kids and what would I say if a random child should ask me?  I think Hollywood should get it together on their Santa lore.

2.  Where am I gonna find the money in our budget to pay for our trip to Hometown between Christmas and New Year's?  I really shouldn't be worrying about this because Hubby took over the budgetting for the year so technically I am giving myself one more month off before I start doing it again but I can't help but worry.  The hotel is like $160 per night.  We are looking at two or three nights.  We don't have that kind of a chunk of change just sitting around.  Besides, if we did I would have already spent it on Christmas.

1.  Is my Grandma ok?  Last week she broke her leg and had to get a rod put in place of the bones between her knee and ankle.  Its times like this when its really hard to live 5 hours away.  I know that my being there wouldn't really do anything except maybe make her smile but I just wish I was.  Calling on the phone just isn't the same.  I miss my Gram.

There you go.  A roller coaster ride through my mind this Christmas season.  I will make my best effort to have my next posting be a more cohesive thought process.  I promise.

Shop . . . Craft . . . Stop . . . Repeat

I love projects.  I love coming up with the idea.  I love the listing of the required materials.  I love shopping for said materials.  I love choosing.  I love creating.  I love seeing the progress I have made.  The problem with me lies in the finishing.  I can't seem to finish a project.  I have half finished crochet blankets.  I have half finished cross-stitch pictures.  I have half finished scrapbooks and drawings.  I even have half painted ceramics.  There are a few projects over the years that I have finished and I take great pride in those.  I don't really know why I have such trouble finishing a project.  Maybe its my ADD.  Maybe I lose interest in the project once I get so far into it.  That could be it.  Maybe its my OCD.  That desire for everything to be perfect.  I know that there are mistakes in my projects so they can never be perfect so why try to finish them.  They'll always be incomplete because they're not perfect.  Either way, I don't know why I do it but I do.  I start a project and then just kind of . . . stop.  I think about them.  I think about how I really should finish them but I just don't.  Maybe its not so much the creating as it is the shopping.  Maybe I justify shopping for materials by starting a new project.  Then I get to make a trip to the local craft store and load up my cart.  Oh my God, I am a shopaholic!  I am justifying my need to purchase things.  I am using my projects as an excuse.  I am making another trip to Michael's today.  Shhhhhh!  Nobody tell Hubby!

I'm Not Maid for Cleaning

Why is it when you have nothing that HAS to be done, you are bored and can't think of anything to do but when you have something that you NEED to do, you can think of a million distractions you would rather be doing?  Right now, I have approximately 24 hours to start and complete my taxes, clean my entire house, and finish my Easter shopping.  This is just not gonna happen.  The shopping I could do.  Shopping is never a problem.  Its the taxes and the cleaning that are going to be the problem.  Actually, I could probably pull off the shopping and the taxes, but not the cleaning.  Its really a lost cause.  I start off by making a list of what all needs cleaned.  Then I feel overwhelmed and like I wanna nap.  If I start cleaning someplace, one of two things happens, either I get distracted by someplace else and move to there before I am finished or it ends up looking worse than it did at first.  Its hopeless.  I'm a lost cause.  Frontrunner is coming to visit tomorrow and her worker is coming to "see our house".  So we're not talking about a little gathering in the living room where I can happily shove everything into our bedroom.  No.  We're talking on the same level as home study.  Peeking in all rooms and closets.  Looking with an evaluating eye at all of our mess.  I've already told Frontrunner that we live messy and she's cool with that.  I just don't want her worker to bring her here to Suburbia take one look at our mess and cart her back to Faraway.  That would suck.  So, I have to try.   I have to at least make the effort.  Right after I finish blogging . . . and call Hubby . . . and finish my ice coffee . . . and . . . I need a maid.