The final day of my Christmas Planner.  I do hope you have enjoyed reading how I plan our Christmas and hope some of the things may have helped your Christmas run a little smoother!

Thank you for all the good wishes I have received for our Wedding Anniversary.  A couple of people asked where the wedding photographs are, well they were pre-digital and I didn’t have time to get the album out and take a picture with my new camera, I will try and get around to it at the weekend.

This was yesterday evening’s job!  To wrap the 74 Advent Calendars for the Small Pool swimmers aged 5 to 8 as their Christmas Gift.  The lady who is my co-organiser has 66 more to wrap too.   I was seeing spots by the end of it having used all the paper and two rolls of sticky tape!!!  Treacle was also very keen on all the wrapping, she is not bothered about what is in it, she just likes opening presents!

I am busy finishing the Christmas gifts, quilting wise, for Christmas and now have another couple of things to do, which I am hoping to get done at the weekend whilst DH and Youngest are out again doing swimming things!!!  I also need to get Evalyn’s quilt finished and quilted as well so may be sneaking the odd day or two here and there to do a bit, but I am at the moment all caught up with work so aim to stay on top of things.

Next job is to plan the Christmas Present shopping.  DH is helping this year, with an arm twisted behind his back! Christmas card writing will be Friday evening and I also need to get the mince pies, Christmas cookies, sausage rolls and cheesy stars made as well!!  I have managed to clear a space in the freezer for a lot of this so it will be ready in time.

I also need to order the meat for the Christmas holidays but as I still don’t know how many I will be feeding so we have decided to go for a medium sized bird and also get a piece of beef, so if I end up feeding them all I will cook both, DH actually prefers beef to turkey or chicken so he will be happy if that happens!

The Christmas cds’ are going in the Jeep this week as well!!!

This was Treacle on Sunday keeping me company in Eldest’s room whilst I was sewing.  I can tell you that she snores, a lot!

I hope you are having a Thrilling Tuesday.

Hugs, Susie xx

Here is Day Five of the Christmas Planner and we have reached Christmas Week.  Usually, even with the planner and all the organisational skills, I have shouted that “its all not worth it for three days”!!!!  But I defy any Mom/Wife/Partner/Girlfriend who runs Christmas to say that they have not uttered these very words at least once in the run up!!!!  I think we all end up tired with all the events, childrens’ things, parties as well as work and all the normal things which have to be done too.  Add in all the coughs, colds and worse that go round at this time of year and you end up in a state.

I can honestly say I don’t have an answer for this, except make sure you are getting your vitamins, take time even if it is only five minutes to decompress each day and delegate some of those jobs.  Difficult if the children are little but your Dear Husbands can be dragooned into helping or a very good friend.  A job shared is a job halved!

Our weekend was, as you know, swimming, swimming and Remembrance Day.  The little ones had their Championships on Friday evening and they did great.  We had a few tears and a couple of children who flatly refused to swim but the rest did and they got trophies for the top three and all the rest got medals so they went home happy.  Saturday night it was the turn of the older ones in the Arena League and our Club were hosting.  The pool we were at was extremely warm which is great for the swimmers in costumes but for the rest of us we about melted.  However It did not stop our Club from winning!!!  The final round is on December 9th but we do not know where as yet!

DH and Youngest were helping at the Remembrance Day service in Alfreton but I stayed home.  It was very cold but sunny and it did not rain this year which always helps.  I watched the service on TV at the Cenotaph in London.

One of my jobs this week is to wrap 68 chocolate Advent Calendars for the swimmers aged 5 to 8 in the Club for their Christmas gift.  We usually hold a party and my other organiser decided after last year we should try and do something different.  We looked at taking them to the Pantomime but it was too complicated to organise, then we thought about a splash party for them but we couldn’t do that for health and safety reasons so, having run out of time, we have bought them Advent Calendars instead!

I have a busy week with work this week and the weekend is another swimming and swimming weekend!!!  I will also be writing the Christmas cards this weekend too.

I hope you all had a lovely weekend and a good week to come.

Hugs, Susie xx

This is how I felt this morning!!!!!!

Christmas Planner Day Four and into the Third Week of December, when everything is going well and you are completely organised or you are about to tear your hair out and hide under the bed covers, never to be seen again!!! 

This page is where if you have not got things done before this I give you some alternatives. I have, in the past, actually utilised some of these if it has been a manic year and especially the run up to Christmas. 

I am slowly getting presents organised and am just waiting for Felicity to tell me what Evalyn would like for Christmas and what to get Owen, who at nine months old will probably not know what is happening!!!  Our diary is also getting booked up with visits to family and friends who we won’t see over Christmas and to me this is the best bit of Christmas, seeing everyone.  This year I have even managed to get to go to the Advent Carol service, which I have missed the past few years because of, you guessed it, swimming!!! 

I am busy getting on with my quilting and will show you as soon as it is finished! 

I hope you have a wonderful Autumn Weekend.

Hugs, Susie xx

I think this look says “oh for goodness sake hurry up and take the picture so I can get these ridiculous things off my head”!!!!!!!!!

Here is Day Three of the Planner and we are into the First Week of December which of course is actually only now four weeks away!!!!  Oh boy! 

Today DH and I attended a funeral in the village of a person we have known for eighteen years, Janet Easter, who was the school secretary at the village school when our Boys attended.  If ever there as anyone who was not politically correct it was Janet!  If you knocked on her office door to see her after collecting the Boys from school her first response was “GO AWAY”.  Of course you ignored this and went in anyway and if she really didn’t want to see you she would tell you to “B…..   (rhymes with sugar!) Off”.   This actually meant she really liked you!!!

Janet is second from the right and her husband, John, is second from the left.  They were Judges of the Carnival Floats in 2011

DH was a Governor at the school for a number of years eventually being Chair of Governors for four years and so had a lot of contact with Janet, as well as seeing her at social things as well and she really was the most lovely of people but you always knew where you stood with her.  She will be sadly missed by all and the village especially.

We spent the day with some very good friends of ours who knew Janet a lot longer and afterwards the four of us went out for dinner, which was a nice way to end a trying day.

Tomorrow is house jobs day and getting things done before the hectic weekend of swimming events and Remembrance Sunday!! Tomorrow it is the little ones swimming in their Championships so they are aged 5 to 8!!!  I will need something by the time we have finished!!!!!

Happy Thursday everyone

Hugs, Susie xx

Here is Day Two of my Christmas Planner, hope it is helping! 

Yesterday got away from me!!  Work, the Boys, ironing and its only Tuesday!!!  I got some Christmas presents bought the other day, which is earlier than planned (!) but they had a 20% off special for the weekend, at least it saves me going to their store!!!

I went to see Carol, the Boys Godmother, on Monday for her Birthday and spent a few hours with her and it was lovely to do that on a Monday!! This coming weekend is going to be all swimming and also Remembrance Sunday and the weather is supposed to be nice if cold!  We are definitely heading into winter with frosts most evenings.  Treacle is not spending much time outside now, especially early in the morning with the frost on the lawn and its cold on her paws!!

As you can see we are in hibernation mode!!!!!

I have booked her spa day for the end of November just in time for Christmas. Her Wednesday Wag will be back next week.

So far I have managed to get up to date with my work and I am going to sneak off this afternoon to do some quilting otherwise I will not get everything finished in time for Christmas, but don’t tell anyone!!!

I hope you are having a Wonderful Wednesday.

Hugs, Susie xx

Christmas is coming, whether we like it or not and as promised here is a Christmas Planner which I use every year.   It is slightly late as I had trouble uploading it (!) but with the help of DH it was now worked.  However you are still in time to do the things listed.  Each day this week I will be adding another page of the planner, which will take you up to The Day and I hope you enjoy it and find some of it helpful.  I had fun  putting it together.

We had another lovely day yesterday when DH, Eldest, Girlfriend and I had Sunday Lunch at Hassop Hall.  Both Sundays we have been out the weather has been lovely and sunny if cold and the meal was great, it was lovely to relax and do nothing else!  We did joke as to where we are going next Sunday for lunch but it is Remembrance Sunday so DH and Youngest are out helping at the local service.  We also have the small pool swimmers championships on Friday evening for our Club and then we are hosting the Arena League swim meet on Saturday evening, so normal service resumes!!!!

I went to see the Boys Godmother today as it is her Birthday and she wanted to arrange for us to see them before Christmas and we have one Saturday left, the 16th, so we got it in the diaries quickly before it got booked up!!!  It is very nice to be busy but it is also very nice to stop sometimes!!!

The nights are drawing in really fast now and it is starting to get dark by 4.30pm here and when it is it seems so much later.  We were coming home from our lunch yesterday and it was 5.00pm and fully dark and it felt like 9.00pm!!! 

Treacle managed okay over the weekend with all the fireworks going off and slept most of this morning.  I have booked her Christmas haircut for November 30th as her coat seems not to have grown a lot since we had her cut in the summer.  I am really pleased as I am ticking jobs off my list at a rapid rate. 

I hope you all had a lovely Weekend. 

Hugs, Susie xx

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