Whew! Thanksgiving is here. I'm some kind of masochist, I tell you. Last Thursday night, I decided that I absolutely had to paint the living room before Thanksgiving so on Friday morning, I went to L0we's and bought 2 gallons of this beige-y/wheat-y color and brought it home. I spent the rest of the day taking all the stuff out of the living room, disassembling the tchotchkes on my bookcase, taping, de-spiderwebbing, removing electrical plates, putting down dropcloths, assembling all the painting materials, edging and putting the first coat of paint on the wall. It ended up looking like a slightly pink version of Swiss Miss cocoa. I went to bed.

The next morning, Ed and I decided that we hated that color and made the decision to paint it the original choice of the same yellow as in the family room. It's a deep buttery yellow called c0wslip. I had already purchased the paint in July (before Ed decided that it would be too much yellow). Now with the pink cocoa on the wall, yellow seemed like a pretty good idea.

Monday I was up at 6:45 getting Joey off to school and then turning into a painting fiend. I got the first coat and edging done by noon afterwhich I took Amy to lunch because it was her birthday.

I came home to find that there was a message on my phone from the manager of my grandmother's apartmentm complex. "Come quick--your grandmother is very ill and can hardly walk. She needs help--she can't care for herself. blah blah blah." So we run over there and find that she's actually doing fine. She had reinjured her ribs that she broke a few months ago and while it was painful, she was still able to sit up, walk to the bathroom, etc. Grandma has a way of exaggerating and making things seem much dire than they really are so her little old lady friends thought she was at death's door and that her wretched grandchildren were ignoring her plight. They often think we're not taking adequate care of her even though we are because Grandma will say things like "Oh, she's so busy, I don't want to call her." I get so irritated when she does that because I'm not too busy to take care of her needs but I can't just divine them out of the air--I need to know what she needs before I can help her with anything. Anyway, I decide that she needs to come home with me even though she protests. I'm not going to let her stay there and get another call that she's got one foot in the grave and the other on a banana peel. Of course you can see where this is going, I'm sure. I get her home and for 2 days, she never complains once of rib pain. She gets herself up from the bed, walks all around my house without any assistance, etc. Arrgggh! I tell her that she is all well now, help her shower and dress her in regular clothes instead of jammies and take her home Tuesday night. She's fine. She just needed a little extra attention, I guess. I just wish she'd find a better way to get it than feigning a near-death illness/injury.

Tuesday, Ed and I finish the second coat of paint and I start to put the room back in order. Around 1:30 am, I go to bed totally exhausted with achy legs and hips from climbing up and down that blasted ladder a million times. (Did I mention that we have 13' ceilings in the living room? Or that I moved the piano?)

Wednesday morning dawns and I get up at 6:45 again to get Joey off to school. Then I launch into a whirling dervish impersonation. I finish putting my home in order, sweep the kitchen, vacuum the whole house, tidy up the bathroom, put the guest room into order for my father (no easy task since the bed was all taken apart with a mattress on the floor), shower, shop for today's dinner and arrive back home by 11:30. Ack! Then I get Joey and we meet Amy for lunch and 5 hours of shopping. By 5pm, my legs and back are killing me. What was I thinking???? And last night I did some laundry while I watched TV. At least I got to do that sitting down.

Today, though, I slept in. I got up at 11am. Ahhh! Then I started my Thanksgiving preparations. Since there are only 5 of us for dinner, I'm making a smallish turkey (13 lbs.) and we aren't eating until 3 or 4 pm so I didn't need to get the bird in the oven until noon. It's happily roasting as I write. The dressing is made and cooking in the casserole dish. Dad brought a sweet potato pie so I didn't have to make a pumpkin pie but I am making a banana cream pie later. The potatoes are peeled and awaiting the cooking process and the brocolli will be steamed later. All is in order and I can FINALLY relax for a short while before I have to worry about doing anything else.

Tomorrow is more shopping. We need to get an early start so we can get some winter boots for our trip and I need to order some ski pants. Do you know how hard it is to find plus-sized ski pants? Oh my gosh!!! No wonder I quit skiing. I've lost 2-3 pants sizes, depending on what brand of pants I'm trying on but I'm still not small enough to wear regular sized ski pants. Next year, though, watch out!

Looking ahead, there is no end in sight for the busy-ness. This weekend is put up the tree time which means going to get the tree and driving to Amy's house to get her ornaments that I'm borrowing again this year. I also have to re-do the window in DeLyn's studio right quick and on Tuesday, after chaperoning Joey's class field trip to the orthodontist, it's Decoration Day for the Festival of the Trees. Wee haw! And then the bookgroup ornament exchange on Friday night.

The week after includes 3 (count 'em) THREE choir recitals and our annual Christmas bash. My head is spinning out of control. I'm going to have to be very organized if this is going to work. That means writing a huge master list and then daily lists for the next two weeks of everything that needs to be done and when. Perhaps I'd better get started on the invitations so I can get those in the mail tomorrow. I hate it when Thanksgiving is so late! It really messes with my Christmas schedule.

Time to go relax. I've got 45 minutes left. Bye!

--L