I’ve started this post numerous times and it would not save, so I am once again going to try to explain my Holiday from a trucking family perspective. This is even the 4th attempt today to finish this and get it posted… I simply cannot start 2012 until the story is told.

It’s very hard to plan anything when Clint is on the road. He works hard all week long and understandably doesn’t really want to deal with anything when he gets home on the weekend. I try really hard to manage things so he can rest easy while home, but sometimes my level of overwhelmed hits the roof and I simply cannot function. This was one of those “sometimes”! In fact, I’m still trying to deal with feeling overwhelmed and I’m pretty sure I’m just messing things up worse. I know I’ll have to fix them later, but that is just how it is for now! So back to, or on with, Christmas at “Chez FatandHappy”:

Last year and all through the spring and summer months of this year, we had “planned” to have Clint home by December 1st and not back out on the road until after the New Year. Guess what? Yup, it didn’t work out! So around Dec 1st, we decided he’d have to be out until the 23rd and then home between Christmas and the New Year… well, fortune did finally shine down on us (a GREAT paying load) and he got to come home on Wednesday, the 21st. I was sooooooooooo stoked! That would give us DAYS to shop and make sure everyone got what they wanted and I had time to decorate and wrap and cook… yeah, you get the picture… a “perfect” Christmas.

This is how I started the week before Christmas… Banana, CollegeBoy’s girlfriend, had helped clean and do some decorating, and I could see the floor in front of the book cases again, but there was still a lot of work to be done! Not to mention a tree bought, brought home, put up and decorated!

As Clint was finishing up his short week on the road, his mom, Granny, was feeling worse than normal and while it took all day, she was finally persuaded to go to the hospital. They admitted her. Boom… Granny would not be coming over for Christmas day and we now had to figure in visits to the hospital with shopping and exchanging gifts and just hanging out and spending time with family.

Needless to say, my stress level was through the roof and looking for a landing spot on the moon, but Clint got home and immediately I felt better. He was on the phone dealing with Granny and sis-in-law and bro-in-law and all the aspects of the hospital stay. He laughed at my perceived predicament, told me all would work out, and promptly took a nap. LOL Just kidding, it was bed time already!

Thursday dawned bright and sunny and… promptly became cold and cloudy! As we tried to wake up and get around and get ready to shop til we dropped, it became clear around 2pm that we were running out of daylight fast. We loaded into our Big Red Dodge Pickup anyway and set out for the big city. List of gifts to buy, check… plans to have dinner with bro-in-law and family, check… plans to visit Granny, check…

I’m sure you’ve guessed the outcome, but I’m gonna tell you anyway! We visited Granny and went out to eat. NO SHOPPING. By the time we were done eating, it was just time to get the hell out of Dodge!

Besides, tomorrow was another day, a new beginning, a promise of better things, right?

Yeah… so Friday, we did manage to get up and get around and head out to the AT&T store in the next town over… a couple of new phones as gifts, an upgraded data plan… hell, that was half the shopping list right there! Well, just my luck, their computers were having issues and it took four hours, yes, you read that right, it took FOUR HOURS to get all the phones and services upgraded… more than half the day over, still a LONG list of gifts to buy, still a visit to the hospital to squeeze in… Okay, we’re headed to the big city! We’ll finish up the gifts, visit Granny and I can take ALL day Saturday to wrap!!

Yeah… we went to three or four stores at the mall and managed to pick up a few things and then headed to Toys R Us for the littlest Angel’s gifts… I guess I was tired, and stressed, and suffering from low blood sugar, and maybe a little possessed by demons at that point, because NOTHING in Toys R Us was good enough… Clint just loaded me back into the Big Red Dodge and took me home! I wasn’t even lucid enough to be stressed!!!

I think I might have had some night terrors that Christmas Eve Eve, because Saturday morning did NOT dawn bright and sunny… I can’t even tell you that it DID dawn… perhaps the sun just forgot our little town that morning… I don’t remember. I know we finished up the shopping (yes, FINISHED); and I know Ms. Gurley-Brown, my daughter, came over; and I remember visiting Granny and giving her a gift. That’s it… I can’t tell you what order that was all accomplished in, or what stores (and where) we went to. It was all a blur! When we finally arrived back home, I remember wrapping gifts and giving Clint packages to wrap and I remember handing finished presents off to all the kids (CollegeBoy, TireMan, Ms. Gurley-Brown, ChefBoy, and my pretend adopted son, Animal) and having them stack them where the tree would be if we had one…

But I do remember Christmas morning dawning bright and beautiful and full of promise! I remember saying my prayer of thanks for having a healthy, happy family that would be surrounding me that day to celebrate the Birth of Christ with joy and presents and laughter! Then the MotherOfMayhem (my dear daughter-in-law) and FamilyMan (our oldest son) arrived with the Littlest Angel. Our family unit was all present and accounted for. I remember handing gifts to the Littlest Angel and watching her help unwrap them (whether they were hers or not)! And I remember my sigh of relief that it was finally all over… well, THAT part of the day was over. And, it was a success! And I love my husband, and I love that he gets up everyday and slays dragons for us, and I love that he longs to just be home hanging out instead of slaying dragons, but next year………

So I told you about ignoring this blog… I told you I’m way behind on cooking and cleaning and blogging… I’ve told you about getting in a funk and letting the world just spin by without me on the ride… now I’m gonna tell you about a trucker’s wife’s life.

At Thanksgiving this year it was decided the family would meet at my sister-in-laws house. After much emailing to the family, it was discussed that we would meet on Christmas Eve to exchange gifts and enjoy the time together… well, this past weekend, it was decided that Christmas Eve at said sister-in-law’s house was not going to work out so we would have our gathering HERE on Christmas day. Imagine the shock and awe I felt when faced with this situation and a house full of Clint’s father’s stuff that we brought back after he passed away. My dining room table has held boxes piled 3 feet high since last spring! Needless to say, I wasn’t really feeling all that cheery!

Add to that scenario the fact that I have done very (VERY) little shopping and don’t really have a lot of extra money to pull off all the gifts I need for 5 kids, 1 daughter-in-law, 1 girlfriend-in-law, 3 exchange gifts and 3 beautiful grand children… AAAAARRRRRGGGGGHHHHH…

Well, Friday night the CollegeBoy and said girlfriend-in-law arrived home from college for Christmas break. Banana (the girlfriend) was so happy and excited to be spending time with us and could tell I wasn’t very excited about the Holidays so she offered to help clean, organize and decorate. Really? She finally gets a break from college life and she wants to clean? Well, Sunday, while I was faithfully watching my Kansas City Chiefs beat the undefeated Green Bay Packers, my dear, dear Banana cleaned off the dining room table, washed all the dishes and decorated with my cute little Dickens figurines. It looks so nice in there!! I felt a little stirring of the “Spirit” of Christmas…

And then, the Angel on the top of the tree (my beautiful granddaughter, Jordan) arrived at my house in the evening and finished filling my heart with cheer! We colored with crayons and pencils and markers, oh my! Then we played dolls and bubbles and even talked PaPaClint into firing off a bottle rocket!! Oh what fun! Now I can’t wait for all my family to come and enjoy the birth of Jesus at my house.

Who needs paxil when you have family?

I posted this picture of my office/library space before Thanksgiving saying I was going to get it cleaned up and organized. Guess what? I didn’t… so I started yesterday. We decided the tree is going in this area, so I have to get things moved and out of the way for a HUGE tree…

Here’s what it looks like today… I *can* see the floor now, too, which is nice, but… I’m going to get this done no matter what! Prayers, prayers LOL

YES! I’m so excited! I’m still cooking my favorites for Thanksgiving, but it won’t be at my house, so I’m super happy I don’t have to try to rush around and clean up before I can sit back and enjoy the festivities! Here’s what I’m making… some by request, some just for ME!

One of my favorite flavor combinations is apples and onions. I made Rachael Ray’s Apple and Onion Stuffing a couple of years ago and it was a hit, so it’s coming back this year. I made some as muffins and some in a 9X13 pan. Either way, it’s fantastic!!

I’m also making Ina Garten’s Orange Baked Ham. This is another sweet and savory flavor combination that most folks seem to enjoy. I use any jelly or preserves I have on hand. Doesn’t matter which mustard, either… gotta get that garlic in there though! The more the merrier, I say!

I don’t really have a recipe for mashed potatoes, but this recipe at Campbell’s Kitchen comes the closest, so until I actually take pictures of my process, I’ll let you imagine the added flavor of chicken broth instead of plain water!

By special request, I’m making Paula Deen’s Ground Beef and Baked Beans Casserole. This might be for the night before or the day after Thanksgiving! Sort of a break from the traditional and still filling!!

And, finally, I’m going to “attempt” the Pumpkin Roll. It’s been requested and no one is brave enough to try, so that leaves me… I’ll be posting photos this week of my trial and errors. Remember, I’m lazy, and this is a lot of steps! If it looks and tastes good, though, I’ll probably freeze it until our actual celebration (which is after Thanksgiving Thursday), but I’ll post good and/or bad. Stay tuned and…

love, live and cook!!

It’s the time of year when I start thinking about family and friends getting together for the holidays and how I don’t want anyone in my house because it’s such a mess. This year, Clint’s brother just bought a new place out in the country and have graciously offered to host Thanksgiving.

I’m very excited about this because the stress of getting my house ready for 18 to 20 people to have a place to sit and eat and relax and visit and… well, we’ve made it work for about four out of the last five years, but I’m getting old and grumpy now, and I really think it’s time for someone else to host the family events!!

Another thing I start thinking about at this time of year is decorating. This may be the first year ever I know where Halloween, Thanksgiving *and* Christmas boxes are. Clint has organizing skills so he’s managed to box up and label a lot of stuff for me. The problem is that I just don’t always put things back where they were or even in the same box; yada yada…

I had help from my daughter last year, though, and we weeded through the boxes and got rid of old ornaments and decorations that just didn’t work any more. Then, after the holidays, we managed to get them back into boxes with new labels and into the storage room.

Since autumn is my favorite season, I’m kind of excited to get the boxes out and start rummaging through them again. I’m not excited about making sure there’s room to display things, though. So, yes, as I do every year, I’m trying to find the perfect “holiday/cleaning/organizing” plan so that I can “coast” through the New Year in comfort and good health. I have 3 out of 6 rooms decluttered and clean. Not picture perfect, but okay if someone were to come over. The problem with that, though, is that the three cluttered rooms are all just inside the front door.

We live in an old store front built in 1889 *like* the picture above. I love this building; it was a three story hotel back in its hey day. Time has taken its toll on the inside and outside, but the character (and the plate glass windows) just call to me. We’ve been here eleven years and last year was the first year I decorated those huge windows.

That’s a real picture of our window last year for Halloween.

So, the whole reason for this post is just to announce that yet again, I am joining a “Holiday Organizing Plan” and I guess you all will just have to follow along. If you’re in need yourself, just visit The Organized Home and sign up. I joined late (nothing new) and they are in the Master Bedroom this week. My bedroom is one of the areas that’s uncluttered and fairly clean, so I’m going to work on my office/library first. The office/library is right inside the front door of the building and I’ve really let this area go to hell the past few months. Hopefully by posting pictures of my progress, there will actually *be* progress… so here goes.

Wish me luck, I’m going in……

I wanted to write an entry about Thanksgiving traditions and give everyone a “warm, cuddly” feeling, but I have to be truthful. We’re a “blended family” and the only thing that’s ever the same year after year is that we never know what’s going to happen.

What I can tell you I’m thankful for, though, is that my family is very good at adjusting! After eight years together, we’ve gotten used to going with the flow. I gave up making plans and trying to maintain some semblance of control after year 2. If we’re lucky enough to be all together for a holiday, we certainly make the best of it, however, Thanksgiving hasn’t been a holiday we’ve insisted upon.

For a couple of years, Clint was an over-the-road truck driver, so he wasn’t even home to celebrate with. Other years, the boys are at their mom’s place and it’s hard to celebrate without them too. One year I remember making a bunch of junk food so I could at least enjoy the football game. Turkey’s over-rated anyway, don’t you think?

This year, I’ll be working Thanksgiving day. Don’t feel sorry for me! It’s really just another day now and I get holiday pay!