Tis the Season!

I have been avoiding this Blog for the past week. That's because my mind is so jumbled with all the excitement I don't know how to process it all.

After Thanksgiving it was my birthday. I won't tell you how old I am. And those of you who know how old I am, I don't think you are aware that I have Benjamin Button disease. Anyway, I spent my birthday celebrating....first I went to Publix to buy groceries. Then I came home and made my famous lasagna. (I make it once a year, and it is the best lasagna on the planet, I swear.) I also baked myself a birthday cake...red velvet with cream cheese icing. The Tompkins came over, and we enjoyed mango margaritas and stuffed ourselves until we couldn't move. Or maybe our immobility was due to the tequila? Either way, the 7 pounds I lost last month have been rediscovered.

My birthday was on Sunday but I didn't get my best birthday present until Monday. That's when the kids went back to school after being home for a whole week. Ahhh.....

MitchMan got promoted on Wednesday, officially. He is now Lt. Colonel MitchMan. There is much I could write about the nice ceremony and the people who spoke about Mitch, but I'll spare you the details. Suffice it to say, in the words of my friend Beth Gomez, I hooked up with a Lt. Colonel last night....Woo hoo!

Another big event this week: We bit the bullet and got our yard re-sodded. That was Mitch's promotion gift. Fifteen hundred bucks for grass, to get the HOA off our ass. (Yep, I'm a poet.)

Today my mother arrives from Massachusetts, simultaneously with some of the worst weather we have seen this year in Florida. It is freezing out there and the forecast is calling for "torrential rains." As part of her Christmas gift, we wanted to treat her to a nice Florida getaway vacation so we have booked reservations in Sanibel for the weekend. (Remember, last time she came to visit us Ipo ate her birthday gift. My poor mom....she gets the worst gifts!)

The Christmas season is now upon us and I am feeling pressured to decorate. I just don't feel "ready" yet. There is still a giant pumpkin from Halloween on my porch and I don't have the heart to dispose of the massive fruit because it is still healthy, even though Casey keeps pounding it with a hammer. This pumpkin is a real trooper, so instead of throwing it away, we have decided to give it a Santa hat and call him Santa Gourd. Maybe my fairy godmother will show up and turn it into something magical, like that new Nikon camera I've been wanting.

I hope everyone else is enjoying the season. Yes, it is officially "The Season." Hopefully you are enjoying it surrounded by family and friends, or at least surrounded by people you can tolerate and who don't tempt you to be one of those holiday suicide statistics. If you are not so fortunate, whip yourself up a batch of spiked egg nog or mulled wine. Feliz Navidad!