Lounge wear

Lounge wear is the perfect gift. Especially for the truly slothful (like me)... Today, I got up in my jammies-only they don't look like jammies- and ran to the store. I'm still in them at 3:30 and I feel *almost* dressed.

The children are cuddled up, watching "Harry Potter" and I am "cleaning". Or not. I had all the plans in the world to get something done and yet I'm watching another day fade outside the window. I'm tired, yet restless... The house feels as if it is waiting for something. It also looks like Santa Claus threw up, with all the packaging (thankfully the wrapping paper was disposed of immediately), plastic bubble coverings, batteries etc... But the kids are calm, and that is what I need right now. Calm.

Some asked about the beads in the bracelet. The flowers are the actual bead. I don't know if they use heat or something else, but they are rolled until they are a solid bead...not reminiscent of the flower at all (i.e. no lines, just smooth bead). They smell just like the roses I had ordered for that day. The tiger lily beads have black specks in them. It is a chaplet of the rosary. If I prayed the rosary I could use it...but I am still in a very horrible spot with regard to faith, etc. I cannot make sense of both a kind and merciful God and what has happened to us. I am still selfishly hating the fates and/or God for this. Seriously, I don't know where I am. Why I can't feel him anywhere and a ton of other things.

Yesterday I bought my mom a laptop. I get crazy that way. I have been attempting to buy the love of a woman who didn't really want me and threw me into a crazy competition long ago. But, I bought her one. It started simply enough. I gave her a $100 gift card (along with other little "bits and pieces") for Christmas. She decided to apply it toward a laptop (which I think was a hint for me to give her my old one, but I had already given it). We went to the store. They didn't have the Toshiba I had mentioned was on sale and she found an HP that she liked. I then, recklessly said, don't put it on your charge and pay interest... I'll pay for it and you can pay me. So that's what we did. Which would have been fine if I hadn't uttered,"Don't worry about it," in a fit of madness on the way home from the store...in response to her payment plan options. I well and truly will never learn. But, more importantly, it's only money. And it is blood money at that.

The most fun I have had this holiday? Other than Nik coming home? and that wonderful package? and the other package Nik got from my DU/LLF friends? and the tons of good wishes? The most fun is "Pass the Pigs", a game James received for Christmas. I loved this game as a child and we spent an hour or so playing last night. It is just so incongruous to be tossing pigs around like dice. The case cracks me up, as do the pigs. I suggest you give it a whirl. This is the part where I would tell you that James beat me 8 games straight, but I'm competitive...and embarrassed over my "pig headednes" in not quitting while I'm ahead in the rolling of the piglets.