Time to make the presents

Whew, the first semester of grad school for TOm and I is finally over. We're still awaiting our final grades, but we both turned in our final papers on Friday evening. What a relief to finally be able to sit on my butt and not feel like there is homework I should be doing.

Have I mentioned I'm not really all that thrilled to be doing this whole "school" thing again?

Tom and I have been working on putting the house into some semblance of order. With school, Nicky and that stomach flu we all had, it's been about a month since any real housework was done in earnest. I must say though, we're doing pretty well now. Tom's catching up on dishes and laundry. I've gotten the den into pretty decent shape, organized all the stuff we had in there into storage stuff and give-away/sell stuff, and gotten the den into good enough shape that when Nana came this weekend she was actually able to sleep in there comfortably.

Yesterday we put up the Christmas tree and today I decorated it. Nicky helped with a few items, but mostly he was de-decorating the tree. From about his head height down I've only put ornaments that can't be broken, so hopefully we'll not end up with shattered bits in the carpet.

And hopefully he won't pull or push the tree over. Back when we had cats, Tom and I quickly learned to secure the tree to the walls in a few spots. We haven't done that though since we don't have kitties anymore. The dogs haven't been much trouble, but I can see Benjamin's tail clearing off the outer layer of ornaments along the lower third of the tree too. So maybe some of the ornaments I'll inevitably find on the floor over the next few weeks won't all be from Nicky.

So now, I finally have time to get around to making all the Christmas gifts this year. I have everything I need, and now finally have some time to do it. I'll have to write about what they are later since a lot of the folks who read this blog are on the gift list.

Happy Holidays everyone!