It's been a weird week or so killing time until Thanksgiving. I got my Wednesday cold, and then I piled on the fun with my flu shot and COVID booster last Saturday. Initially my flu arm hurt more, but then my booster arm really started to hurt (like, can't-get-my-shirt-off hurt). By later Sunday, my lower back got sore and eventually I had a massive headache that sent me to bed rather early. Since I was still pretty good Sunday morning, I did get up for church, but only Carter and I went. Craig got home from Canada very late, and I just couldn't seem to get Jacob out of bed. He's sometimes grumpy at church anyway, so for one week I figured I'd let it go and assume he needed the sleep. By the time we got home, he was sneezing up a storm...just in time for JV practice to start on Monday. Thankfully, he was off school all week so we didn't have that judgment call to make, but it was frustrating nonetheless. I gave him a couple doses of zinc and hoped for the best. He was significantly better on Monday, so I wonder if missing his allergy pill on Saturday set him up for trouble (it did me no favors the previous weekend, so who knows). We did a COVID test anyway and he was fine, so off he went to practice. I ended up working from home for the third time in four work days to monitor him, make sure my cold was really gone, and that my COVID shot had no more tricks up its sleeve. I did end up going in for less than a half day on Tuesday to wrap up a couple things, but suffice it to say the last week was a little disjointed.
I've also been stuck in the weird limbo of wanting to get started on Christmas decorating but firmly holding to my "Thanksgiving first" rule. It's an important holiday to acknowledge our blessings, and what's the point of putting out turkeys all month if they're not even there when we finally celebrate it? It didn't help that we got our first real snow the other night, which made it seem like even more of a reality that Christmas is coming. It's mostly melted now, but I'm hoping the snow forecast for Friday will happen to get me back in the mood as I decorate. First thing when we're home Friday will be pulling all of that fall decor down and starting to shift furniture (and toys) to get things in place for trees. But with all my time at home this week (and especially last weekend, even if I felt cruddy) I felt like I was losing out on precious time. I did online shopping instead, which was actually probably more productive anyway. I got a few big gifts out of the way before shortages or price hikes become a problem, and I have plans for most of the rest of the boys' stuff. Jacob's not getting much because he's getting a big gift, but I still want him to have a few things to open. I have a pretty good plan for Carter (and his birthday as a backup if needed), but feel much better with a couple big gifts secured. Everyone else is mostly a mystery still, but the boys are really the most important for me. I've at least started my list of people to buy for and I'd like to knock them off in rapid succession if I can. With all the supply chain issues and everything else right now, it was important to get in holiday mode sooner, so at least that provided a holiday outlet if the decorating wasn't an option.
The funny thing leading up to this week was that my urge to decorate and get in holiday mode was pretty strong, and it didn't occur to me until a couple days ago how challenging getting to that point actually was last year with all the unknowns (and that was all before our COVID Christmas). It also hit me that this Christmas is now equally threatened. Cases are up considerably (to where they were on the back-end of last year's holiday mess), and while officials still maintain 80% of hospitalizations are non-vaccinated folks, it seems like most of the cases we've heard of lately are vaccinated people. They've fared relatively well, mind you, but it's frustrating since vaccines seemed to be the way out of this mess last year at this time, and now we're no better off aside from having a little personal assurance we won't get super sick. All I can figure is that delta is so much more contagious so the same behavior is at least two to four times more productive in terms of spread, and also that the early vaccine adopters, who were the most vulnerable, could be losing their protection if they haven't gotten a booster, and therefore are driving hospitalizations back up. Not to mention that COVID fatigue is seriously a thing and no one wants to put their life on hold any longer, or be even the least bit uncomfortable. At least schools are mostly doing well, but it's definitely getting messier than we had hoped and will likely get worse for another six weeks or so.
Reality hit even more when my extended family's Thanksgiving evening plans got canceled due to a case in the family. The hosts' son-in-law got sick, and they were technically exposed, so it's a no-go. We weren't going anyway since it's in the middle of dinner with Craig's family, but it was a stark reminder how quickly our beloved and much-missed Christmas gathering could go up in smoke, and started me wondering again if we should just commit to masks and find crazy ways to distance (there is usually none there--wall-to-wall people!), especially while eating--like setting up a firepit outside and dressing for a shift in the weather. I think most of us would bend over backward if it meant keeping the older relatives safe and ensuring the gathering could happen at all, but all of a sudden, it's scary again. I feel better to have gotten my booster, but Craig still needs his and I need to get Carter's shot scheduled--flu shot first on Monday, though. But even the thought of Carter getting his scares me a bit, even more because it's the holidays, so there are all sorts of mixed emotions right now. But I know the kids are excited for the holidays and we survived a pretty crappy situation last year, so I'm going to try to press forward as normally as possible and see how close we can get to highly functional/enjoyable.
Another oddity in this busy last week was that I found out our old house is back on the market for the second time since we sold it (third time in 12 years if you count us). I was reviewing the listing for my cousins' house (the one where the fancy desk came from), and happened to widen the map view looking at others in the area for a price comparison. Houses in the map area pop up on the sidebar, and sure enough, there it was! These owners did considerably more than the last ones. They replaced the bushes in the front with a patio (which I always wanted to do), painted the kitchen cabinets (also wanted to do), replaced the last owners' carpeting with laminate in the dining room, painted a few rooms (but our living room color scheme remains!), took down the bathroom border I put up, painted all of the paneling in the basement, and ripped out the super-plush basement carpeting. It looked like old, possibly asbestos tile was left behind (who knew that was there?). But the 70s drug den vibe is officially gone! Most of the improvements looked pretty good, so kudos to them if they get their price, which they probably will in this market. I was just happy to see the cute retro shelves and ceiling plaster designs were still intact. I almost took the boys to the open house over the weekend, but the cold and booster issues pretty much ruled that out.
The past few days leading up to the holiday have been busy, between laundry, grocery shopping, Christmas shopping, house cleaning, work, basketball, and generally getting my life in order. I feel like I've been cramming in errands and household tasks everywhere I can. Jacob had his first JV basketball scrimmage this morning, and when I found out we had a half hour between drop-off and the game, I ran around the corner to Dollar Tree and Aldi to grab a few things on my list. Then later Carter and I ran out to the liquor store and Target before dinner, only to end up at another Target in Buffalo later to pick up something ours didn't stock--and I immediately had (non-)buyer's remorse for not getting the $5 light-up mercury glass tree in the dollar section because the second Target was completely sold out, which tells me they will be popular. I was up until 1am last night puttering around the house doing a ton of different things, and today was almost non-stop, too. Suffice it to say, it seems like the holiday rush has come early.
Jacob's first scrimmage went pretty well. He got 11 points and shot really well. He had a couple giveaways and defensive lapses, but no worse than anyone else and not bad considering he's among the youngest on the team. He's already frustrated with his coach, who literally told him the other day (despite him making the team fair and square) that he should be playing modified instead. That was a shot considering he's actually more skilled than most of the team, but it was good to hear the same coach today tell him he was very pleasantly surprised by his play. He's had this coach before and didn't like him much then either. The coach didn't use him right last time--he still did well anyway--but clearly he's got some picture in his head that Jacob's not good enough. Yet when he's playing in position and consistently, he certainly knows what he's doing as well as anyone out there. Never mind that Jacob has worked his butt off over the last six months playing and training, so he's a very different player than he was in June. I think sometimes Jacob struggles to put into quicker action what his brain is processing should be happening--like, he knows what needs to happen, considers his best route, and moves, but it all takes half a second longer than it should. That should get better with experience as he refines those instincts at this level of play, but he'll get there. Thank goodness the varsity coach really likes him, because maybe we'll just have to endure one year of this before things improve. Or he'll just leave the school if it looks bad, but let's hope not. It will be an interesting season, though. After spending much of my tween years watching my brother and cousins play high school ball, I'm looking forward to it.
Well, Thanksgiving is officially almost here and I guess I won't quite be ringing it in in bed--but it's the holidays now, right? What else is new? This year I'm thankful we get to celebrate, and so many things have felt so much smoother in the midst of the rest of the life chaos that's happening around us, so there is much to be grateful for this year. Time to soak it in and make the most of it before the wild ride of the holidays starts all over again! (Speaking of which, how ARE we here again already?! Didn't I just put that stuff away?)
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