decorating is one of the best parts of any holiday

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Tuesday Randomosity: The Let’s All Pretend I Didn’t Completely Miss November Edition

December already. Another Tuesday. Grey has returned to the sky. Skiff of snow. Never-ending laundry. Blurry hold music, third phone call of the day. My wrist buzzing with notifications from a group chat I did not consent to join. I should be writing. What to make for dinner? A goat bleats in my brain. The persistent grey.

Let’s try to break through the grey and the goats with some bullets, shall we?

  • Dinner is killing me lately. I have whined continuously for the duration of this blog/my marriage about the Sisyphean tedium of trying to figure out what to make for dinner, and lately it seems to have come to one of its periodic peaks whereby I cannot envision even one dinner or its components. My list of Reliably Delicious Dinners looks like gibberish. My husband is infected, too; last night I asked him for ideas and he listed several options, all of which were side dishes made solely of potatoes. The added pressure of cooking for visitors is not helping. I did, finally, come up with something for dinner tonight: one pot salmon with peas, alongside savory garlic farro. My visitors love salmon; my child enjoys salmon; I like salmon; my husband dislikes salmon but has bravely agreed to eat it for the sake of harmony and wifely sanity. 
  • I am gearing up to cancel a service and ask for it to be refunded. I don’t actually think I will get a refund, but I am kind of gleeful at the prospect of talking to someone about why I am cancelling this completely worthless service. The only problem is that I don’t do great with confrontation, so I’m trying to prepare in advance what I’m going to say. Perhaps then I can be very methodical in my explanation also prevent myself from going all shrill when I enter into confrontation without warning. I don’t want to yell or be mean to whoever I talk to; it isn’t her fault that her company sucks. But I do want to be very clear about why her company sucks and that I Am Done. It would also be nice if they listen instead of writing me off as a Karen or a crank.
  • Speaking of companies that suck.  I got a letter recently from a financial service that there is an error with how my name is spelled in their system, and that it does not match how the IRS spells the name, which of course is going to result in, I don’t know, my imminent execution or something. Fine, whatever, I can fill out a form with the correct spelling. But guess what the misspelling they have on file is? My correctly spelled first name, my correctly spelled last name, and an ampersand. Like… couldn’t the people at the financial services company just… remove the ampersand? Is it not obviously a typo? 
  • The above reminds me of an issue we had years ago with our health insurance. The health insurance company was rejecting a fully covered claim because the name that the hospital billed under was not exactly identical to what the insurance company called the hospital in their own system. I can’t remember the exact ridiculousness, but it was something like, the insurance company covered Polkadot Rainbows Hospital and the hospital sent bills to the insurance company under the name Unicorn College – Polkadot Rainbows Hospital. And then I was stuck calling both the hospital and the insurance company and trying to get them to understand this stupid, stupid discrepancy that should not affect the coverage of my claim in any way. I am still salty about it, nearly two decades later. 
  • Perhaps could I come up with a bullet that isn’t quite so grumpy? Hmm. Hmmmmm.
  • Carla is in the most delightful holiday mood.  I woke up on December first and thought, my goodness, it’s December, and I have done NOTHING to prepare for Christmas/Hanukkah, and was about to slide down a long dark hole of holiday despair… but then Carla came skipping into my bedroom wearing a Santa hat AND reindeer antlers with jingle bells on them and announced that she’d already started decorating. Then she played “All I Want for Christmas Is You” on repeat for the rest of the day. THAT is the kind of Christmas energy I want to slather on myself like body butter. 
  • Should we do a cookie swap? One thing I have been eagerly thinking about as December sneaked up behind me and shoved me headlong into the holiday season is what cookies am I going to make???? Since I love talking about cookies as much as I love baking and eating them, I wonder if anyone would be interested in doing a bloggy cookie swap? Like, we all make cookies and document the process and then blog about it? Is that dumb? Does that require more organization and planning that I can handle? Alongside some of my old standbys and Nicole’s gingersnaps, I think I am going to try making these cranberry lemon bars. 
  • Where are you in the Christmas prep process? So far I have: 1.) finally ordered holiday cards, which I kind of threw together at the last minute on Sunday, but that’s okay because they are ORDERED, 2.) purchased a few presents for Carla and for my husband but zero presents for the other eight family members for whom I usually buy presents, 3.) bought a last-minute Advent calendar for Carla only yesterday, 4.) grabbed a little bag of gelt for Hanukkah from Trader Joe’s, and 5.) thought extensively about cookies. Oh, and I also sent my friend a Christmas goat. In terms of decor, the decorating process stalled shortly after Carla came into our bedroom and announced that she was decorating, so we have stocking holders up on the mantel, two reindeer kissing on the sideboard, the Christmas countdown figurine sitting on the kitchen table and a bin of other decorations sitting on the floor of the living room. All the other bins of decorations AND the Christmas tree are still on shelves in the basement. December is only three days old and already I feel very behind. 

That’s all I’ve got for today, Internet. I hope you are well. I miss you and I’m sorry for being such a crap blog friend lately. 

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Six for Sunday

Have you been affected by the hurricane? I hope you and your loved ones are safe and sound. 

It’s a dreary, wet day and I think my family and I might curl up in front of some Stranger Things this afternoon instead of doing anything productive. Before we do that, here are some random bullets.

  • Tropical Weather < Fall Weather: The hurricane has furnished my part of the country with days of rain and humidity. While I’m a huge fan of (occasional) gloomy, rainy fall days, I am not enjoying the sticky damp. I’m assuming this is how it feels to live inside a rain forest, based purely on visiting Rain Forest exhibits at the zoo. No thank you. Humidity and I do not get along. I have not bothered to dry or style my hair in a week. I tame the mass of wavy frizz with water, then wrangle it into a ponytail or bun and hope for the best. I use Aveda Smooth Infusion cream on my hair every time I wash it, and it smells good, but who honestly knows if it helps keep the frizz down. I mean, I for one am not willing to face the humidity without it, but there might be a better option out there?
  • Fall Colors: Despite the faux-Florida weather we’ve been having, the leaves are beginning to change. I especially love the trees that are steadily green except for a patch or two of vibrant yellow or orange – like there are a few flamboyant trendsetters who cannot wait a second longer to don their autumn regalia. Because the weather has been so temperate, flowers continue to bloom. In fact, a few of my neighbors’ hydrangeas seem to be flourishing. I love seeing bright pink flowers against a backdrop of red and orange foliage. It’s weird but beautiful.
  • Spoons Update: Surely you have been waiting on tenterhooks for me to follow up on the spoons situation. Here it is: Filled with confidence from your comments, I approached my husband with the bold suggestion that we replace our flatware. He was all for it. (Aside from the spoons issue, he hates our knives.) So we started researching replacement sets and immediately hit two walls. First, we agreed that we would want to touch and hold any flatware before we buy it, and second, my goodness, flatware sets are PRICEY.  Because we continue to have New House expenses, I am reluctant to drop $600 on a set of flatware we love. So what I did was buy a $10 set of six spoons from Target, on a whim. They are perfect. Now we have plenty of spoons, and a source of inexpensive spoons should any of them disappear. My husband likes them so much we added a set of Target knives to the mix as well. 
  • Dwarf Spruces: Well, I guess I am really in Mundane Updates mode! If you’ll recall, the last time I talked to you about my dwarf spruces, one had died. My only recourse was to find a replacement, but all the replacement spruces were… what is a tactful way to say this… more robust than my surviving spruce. I found it surprisingly difficult to ascertain this at the garden center, and only discovered it once I returned home, spruce in tow. Fortunately, the good people at the garden center took pity on me and allowed me to exchange my new spruce for a smaller one. They are still unbalanced, size wise, but less so. So far, the new guy seems to be staying alive. 
  • Ghost Update: As long as I’m updating you on things, I might as well give you the status of the ghost situation. I went back to the garden center where I’d seen the ghosts of my heart; they were both gone. Sigh. I had some found time one morning last week (I took my kid to the dentist, ran into a friend who was taking her kid to the same dentist, and said friend took both kids to school, freeing up a glorious half hour of driving time for me.), so I made a little tour of Michael’s, Target, and the dollar store to see what kinds of ghosts I could rustle up. The first thing I have to tell you is that all the stores are already selling Christmas décor, which I understand from a retail perspective but which is BONKERS to me from an it-is-not-yet-October perspective. The second thing I have to tell you is that the fall décor was limited, due to making room for Christmas stuff. Fortunately, Michael’s and Target had a decent selection of Halloween stuff, and I walked away from Michael’s with two ghosts. Target had quite a few ghosty options, and I came home with a stand-up ghost (or I could hang it somewhere; it has a little twine loop at the top), and with several pictures of outdoor ghost options for my husband to consider. Target also had some tiny orange battery operated twinkle lights that I can add to my dwarf spruces on the porch. As you can see, my found half-hour was well-spent and my purchases are quite satisfying. 
I do realize that I was originally on the hunt for OUTDOOR ghosties, and these are all ghosts of the indoor variety. OH WELL.
  • Fall Décor: While I feel pretty set, now, on Halloween décor, I do wish I had more in the way of generic fall decorations. (Apparently I have been making this same wish since at least 2016.) I would love to be able to have something to bridge the gap between Halloween and Thanksgiving. Not that I have any super specific ideas about what I’m looking for. Maybe some pumpkin throw pillows? Oooh, these autumn trees are so pretty! But… I have a pair of white light-up trees, on a recommendation from Swistle, and I like them; but now I’m wondering if I need two separate sets of light-up trees. Jenny’s post about 100 pumpkins has me convinced that I could probably make do with real pumpkins and squash as my sole decorations. I really wanted to find some white craft pumpkins that Carla and I could decorate a la the dipping technique we have used before. But I could not find what I was picturing ANYWHERE. (The pumpkins at Michael’s were cream, not white.) Even Amazon has low white-craft-pumpkin supply, and I am reluctant to buy anything from Temu. This grouping of seven pumpkins has promise… but do I really want to spend $18 on seven pumpkins? I like these pumpkins, too, but again… a bit pricey, no? I am still on the fence, pumpkin-wuse. Crate and Barrel does have quite a collection of white ceramic turkeys – which I resisted mightily a few weeks ago (say it with me, friends: I will not spend $60 on a white ceramic turkey.) – but perhaps I will have to revisit them. 
Yes, I see the white pumpkins… but I don’t like these pumpkins as much as I love the turkeys. But would I prefer one giant turkey or a flock of tiny turkeys to use at each place setting? I am not buying a turkey.

What’s new with you this weekend? How do you keep your hair frizz-free? What kind of fall décor do you have in your house?

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Feeling Ghosty

Last year I was so stressed from moving that I didn’t decorate AT ALL for Halloween. Which made me sad (and guilty) because I like Halloween and decorating for Halloween (and because I failed to make Carla’s first Halloween in the new house Fun and Homey). This year, I’m feeling very excited about decorating for Halloween and have already been scoping out décor for weeks.

My favorite Halloween decorations are ghosts. But not scary ghosts. I prefer happy, or at the very least apathetic, ghosts. 

I came across these AMAZING ghosts, the ghosts of my heart, at a local garden center.

But my husband played the role of Frugal Spouse (we take turns) and persuaded me that $50 and $100 respectively for these ghosts was too much to spend. I perhaps disagree, but I am also cheap frugal so I did not buy the ghosts. I still think about them, though. Maybe they will go on sale and I can snap them up?

Ever since I declined to bring those beautiful ghosties home with me, I’ve been searching for the perfect reasonably-priced alternative, with very little success. I have two goals: Outdoor décor and indoor décor. I need much less indoor décor. 

Want to join me on a little online ghost perusal????

I love the IDEA of these tree-wrap ghosts… and have some good place to hang them. But I’m not sure if I love the ghosts themselves? They appear to be singing, but sarcastically?

Maybe porch ghosts just cost a lot of money???

This is a cute sign for our porch, and much more reasonably priced, but I don’t LOVE it. 

These light-up ghosts are nice and tall, and meant for outdoors, and I like how they could be bemoaning their deaths or simply yawning… hmmmm. I mean, I do prefer sleepy ghosts to scary ones. I’m on the fence here.

I suppose I could make my own porch ghost… but do I want to do that? And is a sheet really going to stand up to October weather patterns?

These little lights are cute. Maybe I could use them to ghost up my porch trees?

I love these sweet little yard stakes.

This choir of lawn ghosts is quite charming and is supposedly meant for the outdoors. I can’t tell what they’re made of though; will they melt the instant snow falls?

Oh my gosh I love this little guy.

I find these glow-in-the-dark ghosts quite adorable. And when they are all in a group, the scariest one just looks grumpy.

I like the idea of this stack of ghosts (which also glows) but I can’t tell what it REALLY looks like, and that makes me a little leery, you know? (The one review with photos still doesn’t adequately show the size.)

While we’re thinking about glow-in-the-dark, what about these cats with glowing eyes?!

We do have some trees that I could cajole into hosting some hanging ghosts.

Okay. Let’s move indoors for a moment. 

One of my favorite things to put up each year are my wall bats; so it makes sense that I find these wall ghosts deeply appealing. Do they seem a little whiny though? Would they detract from the bats? How many walls full of stick-on creatures will my husband tolerate? (I hang the bats with wall-safe sticky putty.)

Oh my goodness – a ghosty companion for my bookshelves! 

I am in love with these ghosty hand towels.

These ghosts are nice and friendly – and I’m partial to groupings of three – but are they too friendly?

I feel like these guys have a more holiday-appropriate attitude.

Ooooh I’m a fan of these wooden pumpkins. Sorry. Switched it up on you there didn’t I.

Do I need a ghosty cake stand? With a matching ghost bowl! 

I most definitely want this trio of ghost figurines.

How about a pair of stained glass ghosties to hang in my windows?

This is adorable and I love the movement. 

Ghosty candy dish!

Although I might like this ghost candy holder better?

I don’t really do a holiday themed pillow, but I might make an exception for these?!

This is the first time I’ve ever seen a door corner decoration! Love this one, too! But is there a ghost version? Yes! And ghosts with spiders AND bats! Oooh! Ghost cat with bat! 

There are TOO MANY FUN OPTIONS.

Okay. I need to stop. Or buy something to scratch this ghosty itch. Or return to the garden center and find a dozen NEW things to lust after. 

Text with my husband. Keep in mind that we have identical exchanges about electronics in which I am the frugal one.