My family member's surgery went well and they are recovering.  It will be a while before things are activated and we learn about real results.

I finally made a batch of cookies, no bakes to be exact, last night, but at least we have some cookies for Santa.  I want to make some chocolate chips, maybe later today, but we'll see.  I'm sitting here with a cat cuddling me so I haven't made the move to get to work in the basement, that is at the top of my list.  I need to put things away and organize some odds and ends down there before I can bring the Christmas bins back down to put them away.

Fortunately, no catecism this week, so we can do church tomorrow morning w/o it being the very early or very late mass.  That gives me the rest of the afternoon and evening.  I did delay the to do list this morning by running to Big Lots. I had planned on going after Avery's jujitsu class, but she wanted to skip - which is ok since we hit quite a few classes this week and it's prb best to keep her away from others with the cough she is currently presenting.  Regardless, Big Lots closing all locations is the second biggest loss to me, out done only by losing Value City so many years ago.

Still a few more items to arrive and/or wrap, but most everything is otherwise in order for Christmas - just the cleaning.

Waiting for more word on a close family member today... who made a big leap to restore their hearing.  Praying cochlear brings joy and restores things that they didn't know they were missing.

I keep picking up my phone between other activities.  We've gotten into a routine where we go to Jujitsu on Saturday mornings.  Today I made a batch of blueberry muffins first thing to fuel the kid up before we went.  I also started cleaning up a bit in the kitchen, moving everything off of the island and gave it a more detailed scrub. By some miracle I was feeling motivated still when I got home.and I continued this effort, dumping everything out in the catch all basket that normally sits on the island.  From there I got distracted with the pantry and cleared the top two shelves in order to reorganize.a bit.  A few things were tossed into the trash or to the birds, an item I was looking for a while back was found, and most importantly, I made space for my instant pot, so I no longer need to carry it up from and down to the basement between uses -- which are frequent.

While I worked on this Avery was putting some of the ornaments on the tree.  #win  She's happy there are ornaments, I didn't have to do it, and if someone thinks it looks sparse they'll pardon it.

I also posted a few things to a local Mom's group offering them for free.  Several are new items with tags... no bites.  Trying to get rid of anything anymore is near impossible.  I used to just take things to the City Mission in town, but that location closed.  I have a bag of clothes upstairs to donate -- at least those have a destination as the cat rescue I adopt/volunteer with has donation bins that earn them money.

Speaking of cat rescue, yesterday was two weeks since Jackson left.  It sounds like he's made some progress, which is good.  Due his shyness they did offer an extra week to the adopter.  Here's hoping the next week shows him blossoming even more.  I just know once he relaxes and shows his cuddliness it is all over.

I don't know how the girl who used to have most of her Christmas shopping done by September (I made my money in summer months) has become the girl who: 21 days before Christmas only has the tree up with lights - no ornaments, is still waiting for gifts to arrive, still needs ideas for a few people, hasn't wrapped a single item, hasn't put the rest of the outdoor stuff up, and not a single cookie has been made.

I am seriously thinking about just adding tinsel to the tree (it has some gold tips built in) and calling it a day.  It has been so cold, getting things into the ground likely won't happen out front.  I need to take a proper lunch hour to get some things wrapped.  I think part of my issue is that I no longer buy, wrap, and mail gifts to Texas, so no need to have everything in order extra early to get things shipped out Dec 1.

I also wanted to record that I had yet another dream of the long long ago - somehow it blended a lot, it was supposed to be college residences, I had been gone for a while but came back, I was preparing to gather up the stuff I had left there -- including a bunch of furniture that was my mother's, and of course -- he was there w/ her.  He told me to leave, told me that he'd never marry her.  Other friends from back then that I've long since realized were "friends" only because of my presence were dismissive as I tried to say goodbye to people.  It was one of those dreams that seems to have gone on for a rather long time.  There was one that was a friend before that timeframe that is the reason why I went to school where I did, he was the only one there for me in the dream -- and boy did I appreciate that hug, even after I woke up.