Wow, where have I been?

Goodness, it has been over a month since my last post?? I am a bad blogger! Guess "be a better blogger" will be one of my new year's resolutions...

So I switched over to the new blogger, and suddenly I have become aware that I had a handful of comments that I had not approved for publishing--it never told me they existed even though I had it set to--eek! So, if I have any blog readers left after this perceived snub of the commenters, I sheepishly apologize for unwittingly ignoring your comments, and have set it up so this doesn't happen again!

The holiday card ordering rush has passed (thank you SO much to all of you who ordered or told your friends about me), and I am now getting ready for the holidays and thinking up ideas for the business in the coming year. I was sick with a horrible stomach bug during Thanksgiving, so I missed the whole kickoff to the holiday season. I usually love dragging out all the Christmas decorations the day after I've gorged myself to the gills, and remembering all the ornaments and past holidays as Steve and I set up the tree and decorate the house. This year, I was only able to feebly watch TV from bed and drink Powerade for the 4-5 days surrounding Thanksgiving. Somehow, missing the kickoff made it hard to get into the holiday spirit--we replaced our beloved runty 4 1/2 foot "Charlie Brown Christmas Tree" with a 7 1/2 foot monster this year, and while we were excited about having a prelit tree that was taller than us, that thing fought, scratching and clawing the whole way. It took a while to finish setting it up because I only had enough motivation to fight that tree for an hour each day! Finally got the tree up and hung the sparse collection of ornaments (remember, we only had a 4 1/2 footer before!). Somehow that helped immensely--having this big ol lit up fake tree in our house just made it start feeling like the holidays. We miss our Charlie Brown tree, but this one's growing on us. Maybe next year I will be super motivated and create a Christmas tree miniforest, LOL.

I am really looking forward to having friends and family descend upon us and getting to spend quality time with people I don't see everyday (amidst a backdrop of comfort foods and stockings and glittery ornaments and favorite movies). Love this time of year...