So. Are. You. Ready?????

[Rareboy]

For Christmas Day ????(if you celebrate it, of course)

This year, we closed our offices yesterday for the next two weeks...first time ever that I took the days off before Christmas eve.....I have the baking done except for the pumpkin pie that is made on Christmas Day morning before the turkey goes in....the house is ready for guests (we cheat and have a cleaner) and since the head housekeeper and underfootmen are napping on their chairs.....I have also taken on and just completed the task of polishing the silver.

When I was growing up...and many years in the past....the last two days have been an absolute frenzy of preparations....

So what do you have left to do???

[ShiftyNJ]

Tree is done. We're headed out shortly bc the BF has yet to START his shopping. AGAIN. Also need to buy food items for next few days and prep them for the various events.

[meridannight]

christmas is no different to me from any other time of the year, so there's nothing to be ready for really.

[Virge]

I'm as ready as I'm going to get this year. Things have worked out better than I imagined or planned.

Usually for Xmas I've ended up with a few last minute B&B guests of friends on base -- their boyfriends or girlfriends who come to town. Let's be honest about it. What it has always ended up being is horny couples in my house complicating the whole week from Xmas Eve to New Years. We didn't think about that 2 weeks ago when we emptied the 4 B&B rooms and took the furniture over to the nearly complete addition. It's been a great excuse to send them to hotels. Big YAY! about that.

My 5 y/o nephew came over last night to hang out until tomorrow afternoon. Xmas even there will be 12 of us spending the night at my parents ages, 88, 66, 65, 58, 38, 37, 27, 26, 19, 16, 14, 5 -- so we can all be woken up by a hyper 5 year old after Santa visits. Ray is already making a mess in the kitchen, cooking for next 2 days. There ought to be close to 20 hungry people at the parents house by noon Xmas.

It's not quite noon here on the 23rd and close to 6 am for Jay in Brisbane. Due to flying east over the International Date Line he'll leave there at 6 am on Dec 26th and arrive here 26 hours later at 8:30pm Dec 26th. It aint a round trip for the first time. Woo Hoo!

[Lexington]

No. I have one more gift to get, but it's pretty simple (a gift card) - just need the car and the time to go get it. Probably tonight.

Then I need to wrap. I'm the world's worst wrapper. (No, don't bother posting youtube clips of how to wrap presents. I know HOW - I just can't make my hands do what they're supposed to. I'm horrendously uncoordinated.) But thankfully, most of the gifts are small and simple to wrap this year. Well, as far as I know - I have those gifts for my mother at my parents' house that my father insisted on ordering himself and holding there until the actual day, so I don't know how hard they are to wrap...

As usual, I'm on clean-up detail this year, so I really don't have anything else to do until post-Christmas dinner.

Lex

[ShiftyNJ]

No. I have one more gift to get, but it's pretty simple (a gift card) - just need the car and the time to go get it. Probably tonight.

Then I need to wrap. I'm the world's worst wrapper. (No, don't bother posting youtube clips of how to wrap presents. I know HOW - I just can't make my hands do what they're supposed to. I'm horrendously uncoordinated.) But thankfully, most of the gifts are small and simple to wrap this year. Well, as far as I know - I have those gifts for my mother at my parents' house that my father insisted on ordering himself and holding there until the actual day, so I don't know how hard they are to wrap...

As usual, I'm on clean-up detail this year, so I really don't have anything else to do until post-Christmas dinner.

Lex

I suck at wrapping, too. The advent of the gift bag and pretty colored tissue (Which we stockpile and shamelessly gather once gifts have been opened) was a revelation for me.

[Lexington]

One year, I decided "screw it". I bought birthday wrap (instead of Christmas) and deliberately wrapped everything as horribly as I could. That actually went over pretty well.

Lex

[Rareboy]

No. I have one more gift to get, but it's pretty simple (a gift card) - just need the car and the time to go get it. Probably tonight.

Then I need to wrap. I'm the world's worst wrapper. (No, don't bother posting youtube clips of how to wrap presents. I know HOW - I just can't make my hands do what they're supposed to. I'm horrendously uncoordinated.) But thankfully, most of the gifts are small and simple to wrap this year. Well, as far as I know - I have those gifts for my mother at my parents' house that my father insisted on ordering himself and holding there until the actual day, so I don't know how hard they are to wrap...

As usual, I'm on clean-up detail this year, so I really don't have anything else to do until post-Christmas dinner.


Lex

Gift bags......

Or use Chinese newspaper tied with red string....It will look like shit but everyone thinks it is 'artful' and 'green'.

[Lexington]

Gift bag for the T-shirt - no real easy way to do that otherwise - but the rest I'll suck up and wrap. They'll look crappy, but it saves me from having to fill out the "From:" section of the gift tag, yes no?

Lex

[TwisttheLeaf]

All I have left to do is drive 5 hours to moms house.