A Crazy Day, But It's Okay

As soon as the boys left for school this morning, I jumped into the shower so I could take Bee to school and then head to Walmart to get stocking stuff and to buy the stuff for the kids' teachers' presents. While at Walmart I discovered they were completely out of Pillsbury gingerbread cookie dough so I freaked a little, because Drama King volunteered me to make gingerbread cookies for his class "Winter Holiday" breakfast tomorrow morning and unlike Farmwife I had no intentions of making them from scratch. I ran home to prepare the gifts for Bee's teachers during the hour I had left before I had to pick her up. I made each of her teachers and the director, a gift bag with lunch in it, containing a ziploc bowl with screw-on lid full of chili, 2 pieces of cornbread, 2 turtle cookies, a ziploc baggie of cheddar cheese, 2 napkins, and a plastic spoon. I did all this... cookies, cornbread, and chili... in one hour. Really stupid, huh! But I got it done!! Then I picked Bee up from school, went home, rewet my hair and actually did it right, put on some makeup, ironed some clothes, put them on, somehow managed to find two shoes that matched and looked somewhat better than my typical Merrill clogs, and then after calling Inkling to tell her I was leaving for my job interview and telling her to hit the floor (in prayer not because I was holding her up) left for a job interview (did I fail to mention that, sorry). Came home from that around 2:00, Inkling called about then to see how the interview had gone. Tried to clean up this mountainous heap of a mess that I call home for awhile and then left aroun 3:00 to go pick up the boys. Went straight to Target with all three kids to look for gingerbread cookie dough there. I found it within 45 seconds of walking into the store, they actually had a bunch of it in one of those coolers with the sliding doors at the ends of the cash registers where there's usually pop (soda). They were 2 for 5 bucks. Sold, grabbed two, went straight into the empty line right next to the cooler and was out the door in literally 3 minutes from entry. Ain't life grand!! I was so excited that I forgot to go look and see if they had any Christmas plates left (Walmart only had poinsettas, not exactly 2nd grade party material). From Target we went straight to the church, picked up Smart Guy, who took over the driving, went home to swallow 4 teaspoons of Gaviscon, put the gingerbread in the fridge and grab the O'Charley's gift card we had recieved earlier today from friends at church, ran back out the door and went to eat at O'Charleys. I had Chicken O'tenders, smashed potatoes, a salad with their wonderful ranch dressing, shared 1/2 with my veggie loving Bee, and their wonderful rolls. I only ate half of it, the boys ate the rest of my potatoes and I brought the rest of the chicken home for lunch tomorrow. The kids all got balloons on the way out of O'Charleys and you'd have thought they'd been handed gold. We had to stop at the Party Store for the plates I had forgotten earlier. Got 20 of them for $1.59 on sale!! Yeah!! We stopped by the church so I could help Smart Guy hang up the FATHEAD he had ordered for the youth room walls. When we got back in the van, Prophet's balloon made a break for Heaven. Being nine years old he handled it well, but Drama King still popped his when they got home so it would be fair. Actually I think it was partly just a good excuse to make a really loud noise. We came home, I made a ton of little tiny gingerbread men with Bee taking all the scraps and making a huge mound of dough, iced them, (even though I told Inkling I wasn't going to) and now they are drying on the kitchen counter so I can put them in a container in the morning and send them to school with Drama King. I then came upstairs, read Bee a book, prayed with her, her daddy tucked her in and now I am so sleepy that I have actually been rambling all this to ya'll for the last 15 minutes. I actually typically love days like today, but feeling like this has completely worn me out. I'm calling my Crohn's dr. tomorrow, I'm afraid at this point that maybe I've got some inflamation in there somewhere that's making me feel this way, and not just good old fashioned heartburn. I did get to talk to Inkling today and Cleanin' Cuz '75 while I was making the cookies.

We leave for Mom and Dad's tomorrow afternoon after Billy Boy is picked up. We'll be there until Saturday evening. We'll come home, hopefully clean this house and then they'll come over on Christmas Eve and be here until Christmas evening. If it was just my parents coming, I wouldn't worry so much about the house, Mom knows how I've been feeling, but my grandma is coming too, so it HAS GOT TO BE CLEAN!! She's only been here one other time, and well you just have to know my grandma to understand. She's one of those people from that generation that just keeps going a thousand miles an hour no matter what and her house has never been messy a day in her life.

So anyway, goodnight sweet girlfriends, chat tomorrow, if I can find a spare moment!!