Senate passes DADT repeal, 65 - 31.

Yay!

9 presents wrapped, 4 more to go.

since mac has friends over, I was able to get his wrapped now which saves me having to wait until he's asleep. yay! We generally use bags and re-useable boxes, but I bought some paper last year and I am trying to use as much of that as possible. Not sure why I bought it at all. Speaking of paper, I have some Chanukah wrapping paper if anyone would like it.

OMG, you are all so productive today! Me too! It must be the day!

Well, it started out badly. I went in to teach a one-off vocal lesson for a little extra Christmas cash, and of course, she was a no show, which is why I quit in the first place. She can reschedule if she wants, but for double the price. Hey, I was there singing, dunno where you were.

But then, miffed, I decided I would do the errands run all for me. So I went decoration hunting. I hit the thrift stores: $1.50 for new LED window candle. They had more lights there too, I might go back, depending on how ambitious the rest of today is. Then I stopped by our local nursery, where they gave me free scrap evergreen boughs! Buoyed by this, I stopped by the florist and they gave me free florist's wire! Then the dollar store for ribbon and tissue paper for my party favor sacks. And my awesome local yarn store where they gave me free ribbon! Plus $1.00 for some scrap yarn for my bell ornaments for the party bags. AND they gave me a cup of tea. I love my local yarn store.

So for under 10 bucks, plus Kat's boxie, yay, I am totally going to be able to pull this off! Sunday and Tuesday will be all baking all the time. Monday will be the SO's food prep day.

I am just so pleased with myself for chutzpahing up and asking for stuff. The nursery folks were so nice! There was a whole pile of trimmings from where they gussy up the trees, so they were happy to have me take it. And the second guy pulled the top branches aside because he said there were some bigger nicer ones underneath. And there were! Now to figure out how to put them together like I want. I wonder if I could pull off a wreath? Otherwise, it'll all be table and windowsill arrangements.

We're back from the 4 y.o. birthday party at the inflatable bouncy house playland.

This was for Emma, one of Matilda's friends from her first preschool. So we got to see her and Diego and their parents and catch up. That's what we do in the fall since we all went our separate ways. It's nice to still be invited.

They specifically invited Emmett too, and, predictably, he bounced off every structure they had and threw himself around with abandon. But careful abandon so he didn't land on any of the spuds.

One of the other parents who had not seen Emmett work a little kid birthday party made sure to tell me, "Is that your son? Big brother of the year award. He's so good with all the little kids. I think he played with every one of them."

Yeah, that's what he does.

And I'm just back from TJ's where I avoided the Joe Joe's but did pick up the rise-overnight chocolate croissants for breakfast tomorrow.

Oh, and msbelle, for a non-hideous version of O Holy Night, try Future of Forestry. That's the band we're going to see, and they do a lovely version. In fact both of their Advent albums are excellent. Well, all their albums are excellent. Hee. Look how band-smitten we are right now. Yay Christmas spirit!

I wonder if I could pull off a wreath?

You totes can!

Our current favorite version of O Holy Night is the South Park version where they poke Cartman with a cattle prod.

Though I'm sure I've got a prettier one on possibly my Roches album.

Today I played my xmas CD by the Players, a troop of traditional British musicians who play 19th century and earlier Christmas carols on acoustic, traditional instruments (like, the hurdy gurdy for that lovely bit of drone).

It's very Dickens Christmas.

You totes can!

Okay! I'm going to try. Surely the internet knows how. I have wire. I have a ribbon. Who better than me?

Who better than me?

Martha Stuart. But you're number 2.