Missed My Quota

Here we are.  Less than two days before 2012 is outta here and I have totally failed to meet my goal of 50 posts this year.  I did sit down to write a post once this month. Yes, once. But I got less than one sentence into it and ran out of time.  In my defense, I was planning on writing a bunch and getting the remaining posts up this month but in the past 4-5 weeks alone, I've had a bunch of totally legitimate and great excuses.  I may try to knock out a number of posts in the next day and see how close I can get (do I get a prize if I do it?) but in the meantime, here's a list of some of the reasons why I didn't put out one measly post in December before tonight:

• I've been busy.
• Max had a pretty rough recovery from his surgery for the first couple of weeks and I was his main helper.  He didn't need me with him 24-7 but that definitely took up a good chunk of my time.
• My parents came in town for a visit.  They didn't stay with us but I spent as much time as I could with them while they were here.
• On December 4th, I went and picked up a very darling almost 10-week-old yellow lab mix that we named Sally.
• Every day since December 4th, I've felt like I have been caring for a furry newborn that can't wear diapers and needs a whole lot more attention than I remembered puppies need.
• Ran a lot of errands.
• Did lots of laundry but I was so busy with other stuff that more than anything, I excelled at falling behind in it.  Let's just say my kids had to pull things out of their hampers a time or two.  Thankfully I was on top of it just enough to make sure that we all had clean underwear the whole time.
• Got back to volunteering in the kids' classrooms the week or two before Christmas.
• Went to the dermatologist.
• Being a creature of habit, I simply had to make three batches of caramels over the couple of weeks before Christmas.  This involves standing over the stove for a good 30-40 minutes during the cooking process (which I did at midnight one night) and then cutting and wrapping each batch on my own (well over 100 caramels per batch).
• Went to Hudson's last two basketball games of the season...new season starts in January.
• Delivered goodies to neighbors and friends with Hudson's help (I drove and he ran up to each door).
• Took the kids to Temple Square and City Creek to see the lights and then out to dinner afterwards.
• Headed up and coordinated Hudson's class holiday/winter/Christmas party.
• Finished up Christmas shopping, wrapping gifts, etc.
• Shoveled snow a number of times on Christmas Eve (kudos to my little bro for doing the brunt of it!) and in the days after Christmas.  On Christmas Eve I managed to slip on our horrendous sealed driveway and seriously hurt my pride and my hip.  I have a killer bruise to show for it.

To make myself feel a little better about not succeeding in my 50 post goal, here are a few of the other things that I didn't get done this month:

• Our annual Christmas card complete with a current picture (or pictures) of the kids.  I bought stamps for the cards because I happened to be at Costco one day but that's as far as I got.  Maybe New Year's cards this year?  Maybe...
• Never finished getting my neighbor/friend gifts out to everyone...still have a couple of things sitting on the kitchen counter.
• My kids didn't have ANYTHING prepared to give their friends this year.  They both have a few friends to give something to.  Maybe New Year's gifts?
• Get enough sleep.
• I haven't written an e-mail to my family since the 11th of November...I usually write at least twice a month.  The thought of catching up there makes me shudder.
• Take my kids to Zoo Lights (annual tradition)...need to put it on my must-do list for December 2013.
• Check my e-mail on a regular basis...when I finally peeked at my shopping e-mail account yesterday, I had over 900 messages.  Thank goodness I was able to delete about 99.75% of them without having to look at them.
• Not a single thank you note has been written for Christmas gifts (by me or anyone else in our house).

Now that I've succeeded in talking about how crazy busy my life has been, I have to say that I have had a lot of help over the past several weeks.  Meals were brought in by great friends and neighbors, kids were given rides to basketball practice and dance, friends came to play with the kids so that they were occupied while I got things done, a couple of people came to spend time with Max towards the beginning of his recovery so that I could get out of the house, and my hubby did everything he could to help me each day in spite of his condition.

I may be busy but I'm one lucky girl.