It’s been kind of a weird week. An emotional, purposeless, lazy, floundering type of week. Originally I planned on spending the week working, trying to fit in as many last minute dolls as possible. But when I finished a batch on Sunday morning, after feeling so stressed out by them, I decided I was done. Which was good for me, I think, except that when I don’t have a batch of dolls going I often don’t really know what to do with myself. I’m not bored, per se, there is always something to do! But I feel like I’m lacking in my biggest sense of purpose and it’s really disconcerting. Especially when I don’t have any other major things on my plate begging for my attention. It’s so rare to have a week like that, but this was one.
Annie had a grooming appointment on Monday morning. While she was there I stopped in at my favorite thrift store hoping to find some green spined books. In my facebook book club lots of people have been posting pictures of “book trees” that they make with a pile of green books and a string of lights. I really wanted to make one too, but realized I have almost no green books. I really hit the jackpot at the thrift store, though, because not only did they have a ton of green books – they had a ton of OLD green books. Even in a variety of sizes! There were so many options that I didn’t even look at newer books, just gathered up a bunch of old ones. I really like how it turned out! Though I am regretting not getting a few brown ones for a stump. I might have to add to my collection over the next year.
My main goal for Monday was to finish all my wrapping, but I ended up being so busy that day running around that I only had about thirty minutes before the boys got home to do it. So every day was a wrapping day. I finally finished up this morning. Though technically there are still three very large things in the basement I can’t carry up and down by myself, so they still need to be wrapped. We are also giving the boys new bikes, which have been at Greg’s parents’ house for three weeks and still need to be put together and transported to our house and hidden, somehow. That’s Greg’s one and only present related job.
Tuesday was my errand day, though I chose to make it a bit more special and checked out a restaurant I just recently heard of called Manna Cafe and Bakery instead of my usual Chipotle or Qdoba lunch. The place was packed and the ordering process was kind of confusing (a big reason I don’t like to go to new places because I hate feeling stupid and unsure of protocols), but the latte I got was delicious and the sandwich I took and ate in my car (no tables) was really good too. I definitely want to go back someday, not by myself. Because I was only a few miles from the capital, I ended up going to the square and checking out a store I’ve been wanting to see, Fromagination. I didn’t buy anything, but it was fun to do something spontaneous! I was really wishing I had time (and energy!) to walk down State Street and go to all my favorite stores there, but I was in a 25 minute parking spot and didn’t feel up to looking for a new one. It was fun to treat myself to something more than just my usual three store errand run, though.
Wednesday was the big day. The doctor’s appointment I’ve been dreading for the last five months. Worrying about this definitely contributed to a lot of my unease and stress the first half of the week. It’s been weighing on me pretty heavily the last couple of weeks when the possibility of another surgery was looming over everything. But, great news – the bone has healed! The gap that was there in July has fused back together and officially, I am healed. The not so great news is that we talked about the problems I’m still having, specifically walking on uneven ground and walking down stairs like a normal person, and the doctor said that I might just be as good as I’ll ever be again. My upward foot motion is only at about 25% that of my good ankle. He said that pushing it might eventually result in a joint breakthrough and it’ll get better, but because my sprain was so bad, it might not get any better than it is now. Which kind of sucks. But, no surgery was good news.
Casting a huge shadow over that day, and the rest of the week, though, was Greg’s unhappiness with a gift I decided to give him early. A gift I bought in September and was originally very excited about because it involved us doing something special together and having a mini vacation to look forward to. Unfortunately, the gift was only met with stress and annoyance that we’ll have to drive 15 hours in February when the weather is completely unpredictable. There’s nothing I can do to return those tickets, so we’re stuck taking this trip or we’re out the money I spent if the weather is bad. Which I knew was a possibility from the get go, but I was hoping it would all work out. But his reaction definitely left me wishing I had just never gone through with it. Sometimes experience gifts are not all they’re cracked up to be.
Anyway! Because Caden happened to wear a relatively nice shirt to school on Wednesday and because I actually curled my hair and put on real clothes for my appointment, we decided to take a Christmas card picture right after school. I’ve had this on our weekend agenda for weeks, but weekends now apparently make me EXTREMELY lazy and I just didn’t feel like fighting with everyone for a photo. But we were running out of time and I decided that it definitely was something I wanted to push for, so we did it. As fast as possible. And it was kind of crazy. But I think it worked out. 🙂 Above is one of our “best” outtakes.
Another super annoying thing about this week. My wake up time has become even earlier every day. This week, I’ve woken up around 3:45 or 4 every single day. And I absolutely can’t go back to sleep. I hate it! I like to be up early and before everyone else, but not that early!! So having a nap time has become an even bigger priority, even though it doesn’t actually happen half the time I try for one.
Thursday was a mix of more wrapping and reading. I joined a facebook 25 in 5 readathon, so I gathered up the stack of books I wanted to go through. Those top three Christmas books were in a special surprise book box I had ordered for myself.
In the afternoon I decided to spontaneously get my haircut at a new salon in town. It was speedy fast and I’m not entirely sure how I feel about it, but I basically never, ever like my hair, so whatever. At least the ends are fresh and it holds a curl better!
Friday is when I started getting real lazy! Basically, I read all day and night. And for two hours in the middle of the day I met my friends for a lunch, which was really fun! Good to catch up with people again. It was so much fun we’re possibly doing it again on Monday (lol)! On Friday night we did watch the original Tobey Maguire Spiderman, because the males in my house are apparently obsessed with all things Spiderman right now. And that used to be one of my favorite movies.
And today? Reading. More reading. I did make banana bread at 5:00 this morning first, though. I almost teared up it felt so good to bake something. I’ve been denying myself the option to bake ever since I started trying to lose weight. Which also, by the way, not going the best. I mean, I hit my lowest point again this week, down 10.6 pounds. But temptations are really starting to set in. I’m worried about getting through Christmas. I don’t want to stress out about it. But I don’t want to completely lose my motivation to be good, either. I’m not so great at middle ground, though. I have an even harder time making the right choices when my family is home and they’re about to be home with me for about two straight weeks. I’m worried.
Anyway, that has been the week! I’m getting much more excited about this upcoming week with a lot of festivities starting up, and little get togethers in the works. I think I’ll feel better about my lack of dolls to work on when I have so many other things to prep for. But more on all that tomorrow. 🙂
