Look!

Christmas exploded!

So did boxes filled with home accessories!

And clothes…

…and toys…

…and OH MY MERCY will we ever get settled?

By the way, does anyone know where the gold finials that were on top of my china cabinet are? The ones that I got at Kirkland’s?

Because I have no idea.

Trying to sum up the last four days-o-moving would be impossible, but it’s actually been sort of fun - only it’s a version of fun that entails not knowing where any of my clothes are except for five pairs of flannel pajama bottoms and some Umbro t-shirts that I picked up at the outlet in Destin in 1998.

(I’m sad to say that I have been the antithesis of sassy these last few days - the place where sassy goes to die.)

But Sister and her hubby came down Friday from beautiful Music City USA, and they worked their tails off right along side us. Sister and I arranged furniture until the wee hours of the morning both Friday and Saturday, thus leading me to conclude that OCD is genetic. Because there is NO WAY that either of us was going to sleep until we had every chair, sofa and pillow placed, and when we finally gave up the ghost and went to bed, I think we both dreamed about the angle of the rugs and the placement of the lamps.

(I’m still not satisfied with the lamp placement, by the way, but don’t you fret: if it takes me the rest of my life, I will GET ‘ER DONE. Oh yes ma’am I will.)

Sister also hung the curtains in Alex’s room yesterday, and for those of you who have never seen my sister hang curtains (which I guess is basically, you know, all of you), it is a study in precision. And after much measuring, placing, leveling, examining, studying, drilling, bracketing and hanging, she totally transformed the little man’s room with her excellent window treatment installation skills (which she, by the way, will never deem as excellent, because she will look at the finished product and see five flaws that would go unnoticed by the entire world population except for her, and she will vow to fix those five things that are undetectable to the naked eye on her next visit, even though the curtains are absolutely perfect as-is).

As for Alex, he didn’t see his new house until late yesterday afternoon when Mama and Daddy brought him home, but OH! THE ENTHUSIASM! FOR EVERY! SINGLE! ROOM!

And THE EXCITEMENT! FOR THE PILLOWS! ON HIS BED!

And THE GARAGE! How HE LOVES! THE GARAGE!

I think we can successfully categorize the child as an optimist. A very enthusiastic optimist.

Even this morning, as Alex was eating his whole grain bread with organic fruit preserves chocolate Pop-Tart, he looked around and said, “MAMA! Is this my kitchen? Oh, Mama - I LOVE MY KITCHEN! And MY PLAYROOM! I LOVE MY PLAYROOM!”

His playroom is actually a little sitting room off of the kitchen, and my friend NK had the brilliant idea to make it a place where Alex could entertain himself when I’m cooking or cleaning or whathaveyou. So I found an apple green shag rug at Lowe’s for $47, put a little TV and DVD player in there, added a few baskets of toys, plus a rocking chair, a Christmas tree, and a couple of mismatched pieces of furniture that Sister painted (and totally transformed) - and I adore it. It’s my favorite part of the house.

I’ll post some pictures later. After I, you know, take some pictures. Which is always a good first step in the picture-posting process.

So, in a nutshell, that’s it. We’re nowhere finished unpacking, we have a to-do list a mile long, and we haven’t even started hanging stuff on the walls.

But we love it.

And we’re home.

Bye bye, old house.

Hello, new house.

It’s good to be home.

And the internet man came!

I’ll update later….

Greetings from Movingville!

Wish you were here!

So that you could haul things!

I can actually appreciate the humor in this part of the process, because at this stage it becomes all about what you can get in the car. Whereas the first phase of moving is all about Being Organized and Packing Boxes Neatly and Labeling Carefully, the second phase is more along the lines of “you know, I really think that if I took out the carseat and folded down the backseat we could probably get two mattresses and an armoire in there. They may hang out of the back window, but that’s fine, because I’ll just secure them by making ropes from my clothes.” 

We do have movers coming Friday to get the big stuff, and all I can say about that is PRAISE THE LORD, OH PRAISE HIS HOLY NAME. 

However, I have to admit that even though moving is tedious, there have been a couple of bright spots. One of those bright spots is this Earth, Wind & Fire song that’s on a Christmas CD that we have. I have listened to it many, many times on the trip between the two houses, and last night I even called my sister in Nashville so that she could boogie down with me as I drove.

Anyhoo. Bright spot #2. Last night when I was on the way home from taking yet another load of stuff to the new house, I had to run in Walgreens for some carpet cleaner. I was way past hungry and knew that there wasn’t anything at home to eat, but I was also too tired to make a decision about where to stop for fast food.

(File under: Pathetic)

So in an act of what can only be termed Dinner Desperation, I bought carpet cleaner, Cheese-Its, and two Take Five candy bars. Never let it be said that I don’t know how to provide some Fine Dining for my husband (Alex is with my parents right now, so he probably had something even more nutritious for supper, something like chocolate Pop Tarts and Coke. With ice cream).

When I got home, I walked in the kitchen and very humbly presented my meager food offerings to D. He grinned and then motioned toward the stove, where I saw a bag from Dairy Queen. And then he opened the freezer to reveal two Blizzards – a small one with Reese’s (for me), and a medium one with Butterfinger (for him) – and all I can say is that my joy, it knew no bounds.

So D pulled some paper plates out of the pantry, and as he was distributing the French fries I said, “You know, nothing says ‘I love you’ like a bag of fast food.”

“It’s true!” he replied. 

And that is why we’re married.

Because I stink at the bloggy break. STINK, I say verily unto you. At least while in the middle of the moving process. I think I must need the diversion right now.

Plus, I’d better do all the blogging I can while I can since I don’t even know when they’re setting up the internet stuff after we move. But let’s all picture me if there’s no internet after, say, day four in the new house. I’m seeing lots of pacing. And the obligatory twitching, of course. That goes without saying.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m exhausted. I spent the entire afternoon and night in our kitchen, packing up and cleaning out our pantry and laundry room. I also cleaned out underneath our sink, and I found not one, not two, but THREE bottles of Brite floor cleaner, which I don’t even use, two bottles of Murphy’s Oil Soap, which I certainly should have used more frequently, and two bottles of something called Oops!, which is supposed to get gum and sticky residue off of anything, and I apparently I liked the idea of this product so much that I bought it twice.

In addition, I had lemon Pine Sol and lemon Mr. Clean…if I weren’t moving, I might do some sort of multi-purpose cleaner showdown, really just as some sort of last-ditch effort to prove that I have absolutely no life at all. And way too much time on my hands.

In other cleaning-related news (didn’t I say a couple of paragraphs ago that I’m exhausted? why am I still talking? about cleaning products? it must be all the fumes), I have decided that my favorite cleaning product of all time is this one. And this stuff - the coriander and olive tree scent - is divine and will definitely be making the trip to the new kitchen. Emma Kate’s sister gave me some as a gift, and I spray it in our trash can every time I change the bag. Love it.

Now that I’ve bored you to tears with talk of cleaning products, I’ll move on to another scintillating topic:

LIGHTBULBS!

I’m going to bed.