Wednesday, January 2, 2013

It's Time

Usually I extend Christmas until the feast of Epiphany (the end of the season in the Catholic church) on January 6th, but because the holiday started at work for me the day after Thanksgiving yesterday I decided I'd had enough--enough rich food, enough decorations, and enough clutter. It was time to start getting back to normal.

I was craving green vegetables, so Hubby Tony and I stopped by the grocery store for a bunch of kale.  For lunch I sauteed it with garlic and some leftover green onions, then topped it with fried eggs and served the dish with a whole-grain pumpkin muffin on the side.  The simple meal really hit the spot.

Tony got in on the act healthy act, too, tossing the last six stale cookies in the compost pile, including a reindeer cookie with chocolate covered pretzels for ears, black M&Ms for eyes, and a red one for the mouth.  (This morning when I opened the lid of the bin, those black eyes stared back at me accusingly.  I threw the coffee grounds on top of them and closed the lid.)

My first redecorating job involved getting the ladder from the basement and using it to remove the silk poinsettias from the built in plant shelf four feet above the front door of our two-story foyer.  The shelf got a good dusting, then I replaced the normal brass planter containing an silk ivy trailing plant.  To see if the plant's arranged correctly I have to climb down off the ladder and climb up the steps to the second floor. It always takes a couple of tries to get it right.

After dinner we started on the tree, removing swirls of garland, dozens of ornaments, and multiple strands of lights.  Tony disassembled the tree, then carried the pieces downstairs while I picked up fallen plastic needles and pieces of silver garland off the carpet and threw them away.

This morning I finished taking down the holiday decorations and replaced them with the regular decor.  I moved the boxes from the basement (where they'd been holding the items we took down last month) up to the main level, emptied them, refilled them with Christmas things, then carried them back downstairs.  Before I left for work all of the everyday items had been put back in their places in the family room and the area over the cabinets in the kitchen.  

It felt good.

6 comments:

  1. new year....new attitudes.....smiles

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    1. I like to think my attitude is good, but there's ALWAYS room for improvement!

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  2. It is a good feeling to have it all put away in its correct place. I took all the Christmas boxes back to the storage unit before New Year's Day (when they would be closed) and stacked everything back in its place. Although I hated to bid adieu to 2012, I am ready to move on with 2013 and see what it has to offer.

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    1. A new year is a clean slate waiting to be filled...

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  3. We had to get the house ready for New Year so we're pretty much set except that my husband still isn't quite done with cleaning all the windows. We finished most of what we set out to do, the rest will have to wait. We're rather up to our ears in this and that right now.

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    1. Kay, I actually thought of you and your New Year's post as I was cleaning! It's great that the weather's nice enough for Art to clean windows in the middle of winter; if I tried that here the rag would freeze.

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