I have one more gift to craft and then it’s off to the post office. Yippee! This means if you live outside the Portland/Vancouver area, you are getting a Xmas present this year. For those of you who live closer to me. Well. Yeah. Still working on those. But hitting the post office on the 9th of Dec? Definitely a world record.

Had lunch with Liza and she managed to rekindle my Christmas spirit a bit. She bit her tongue and didn’t even mention all the Halloween decorations although she did seem a bit horrified that we didn’t have a tree yet. To keep that tiny ember burning, I informed Kevin that he needed to be in bed with a bowl of popcorn at 10pm because we were going to watch a Christmas movie. Did you know that before Kevin started hanging out with me he had never seen Miracle on 34th Street? Or White Christmas? I know! Good thing he found me, eh?

I will try and take some good shots of the floors and cabinets. It’s pretty grey and miserable today so I cannot guarantee how the pictures will turn out but I will try.

This weekend is crazy Christmas busy. Chop down a tree, decorate the house, hang lights, round up the reindeer herd for the front lawm, visit Santa, birthday party for Jerry, Hanukkah dinner with Liza. Yup. It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

Now, if I could just figure out which storage box holds all the Christmas CD’s I’d be set.

OK, the rains have stopped and I’m no longer frantically treading water. I seemed to have dragged my bedraggled self to the shore and am now lying on the shoreline in the surf gasping for breath.

The Halloween decorations are packed away. (Except for the stuff on our porch. It is too wet/cold to go out there. Gasp. Gasp.)

All the suitcases are unpacked. (Except for the smallest one. Full of Kulia’s clothes that need to be hung, folded, and tucked away. Gasp. Gasp.)

The new kitchen cabinets/desk are installed. At least temporarily. Now I have to fill them up and rearrange everything to my liking. (You guessed it, more gasping.)

The fridge is stocked with fresh fruits and vegetables. When questioned, Kevin admitted that he only fruit and/or veggie he bought while I was gone was a bag of pre-made salad. And some tomatoes. So for the last few days my girls have been begging me for an apple or banana or grapes or carrots and I’ve shoved crackers and cookies into their hands and told them to go away. – mommy is busy trying to tread water. The result, of course, is that now when I offer them an apple or banana the insist that all they want are Cheetos. Or cookies. (Gasp. Gasp.)

And the Christmas presents? Well, those are actually moving right along. If I can convince my girls to entertain themselves for four more days I should be able to get everything into the mail and sent. Yippee!

Except for our Christmas cards. I totally forgot about our Christmas cards. Drat. Maybe I have a few more yards to haul myself before I’m truly on the beach and out of the water.

Gasp.

Gasp.

We are back home but I’m barely afloat. No, I’m not referring to the torrential rains that are lashing out little house right now. I actually heard earlier that the only way to travel from Portland to Seattle was via plane because every major freeway was shut down due to flooding or car crashes. How crazy is that? The rain is hard and angry right now. Sometimes I think there is someone on our roof actively chucking buckets of water over our gutters. Every now and then it changes over to snow but so far we have stayed a little too warm for the white stuff. Just lots and lots of rain.

I am, however, underwater and overwhelmed when it comes to my home right now. I still haven’t unpacked all of our suitcases or started on the laundry. My Christmas craft table isn’t even visible right now and Kevin has had to prop it up with additional pieces of lumber due to it’s enormous weight load. We still have our Halloween decorations up people!

Why the sad state of my house? Well, Kevin decided to surprise me on Friday. When I got home, not only did I have a new floor, I also had a new kitchen! Or at least new cabinets. In boxes. All over the house. Yes, Kevin visited IKEA and brought home Phase 1 of the great kitchen re-do. For the last three days we have been constructing, hanging, leveling, re-hanging, returning and exchanging cabinets. On Sunday, I actually spent over 4 hours driving back and forth and back and forth to IKEA due to various returns and snafus. As much as I love the new look, trying to do this right in the middle of the Christmas rush is pretty tough.

All is not lost, however. Tonight we broke out the footie pj’s for Kulia. Is there anything cuter than a little girl running around in pink footie pj’s? I think not.

Tonight I pass the mantle of cabinet installation to Kevin. I will be braving the rain for a grocery run as we have absolutely no food in the fridge. I have no idea what Kevin has been eating the last week but there isn’t a fresh fruit or veggie to be found in this house.

No time for pictures. Maybe once the rain stops pounding. Right now, it’s nose to the grindstone time people! Christmas is peeking around the corner and will be there before you know it.

Here’s a video of the floors and tile after completion. Today I realized we had the “chromatic” bulbs in the ceiling lights of the kitchen which gave off a redish light and when I changed them out for energy efficient flourescent lights the floors looked the normal oak color. Now, funny enough, everthing looks red in this video now – go figure.

Anyway. I didn’t realize how much Elmo and I sound like an old married couple at the start of this video, it’s pretty funny. But after working next to someone for 12 four-hour days I challenge you not to sound like us. But I now have a greater insight into what Tutu goes through on a daily basis – I am in awe of you Tutu!

I wanted to show Chrissie our new kitchen floors using our webcam and our laptop but was having EXTREME Windows 2000 issues. Let’s just say it wasn’t really Plug & Play until XP.

Anyway, I decided to use the internet to show the world what our floors look like now. The oak turned out more red than I was planning. I note this several times on the video ’cause on the camera screen, with the auto-light adjustment on, the oak floors looked very normal. But looking at it now, on the computer, the redness does come out. So just ignore the comments about them not looking red – they do.

So here’s the video – out with the old vinyl ugliness, in with the new laminate goodness. Hopefully Chrissie’ll like it, ’cause I really don’t want to tear them out.

Kulia survived her first trip to Disneyland and she did great.

It was crowded and overcast, rides were broken and lines long but Kulia was the best little trooper. She skipped from ride to ride. She hung on the bars in line and screamed with joy on the Toon Town roller coaster. We didn’t get to see any characters. They were pretty mobbed and everytime we found one, they were on their way for a water break. But the girls didn’t mind. Disneyland is just overwhelming as is. I’m hoping we can go back after Thanksgiving when everyone is back in school. Maybe then we could see the Princesses and hug Mickey.

Of all the rides, It’s A Small World stood out. They had decorated it for Christmas and changed the song to Christmas carols. It was beautiful. The girls were wiped by the end but made it back to the car without a melt down. I don’t know how much Kulia will remember, but I hope something of the day stays with her. What a great little trooper she is.