Twas the week before Christmas

And I've been ready for the big day for quite a while. That is mostly because we only buy one gift per child plus a few small things in the stockings including some sort of "making" thing they can keep occupied with that day. After all... it's not our birthday! I'm thinking that even though we've already done our family service projects we'll try to find another one for that day.

I read "Unplugging The Christmas Machine" a number of years ago and it gave me permission to do what I wanted to do for Christmas... which was spend time with family, friends, and music. I cut out everything else. No baking. Decorating only if I want to and have time. Minimal gifts, service projects. We send out Valentines cards instead of Christmas cards. Now we have a fun time during December.

So... the Christmas decorations are only half up and when we had guests over this was the most convenient place to throw the tubs.

Also notice bags and boxes everywhere. I got a wonderful box of scraps from the floor of the most amazing artist Carter Smith. I haven't had time to go through it. I'm also behind on my deadline for three quilts that need to be done soon for a group exhibit. And on a class I'm writing up for Quilt University. Granted they were deadlines that I moved up on myself to give myself more time for an even bigger "project" after the first of the year. Ah well. It's good to slow down for a bit.