New Year, Clean Slate

We're back in our cozy home after 10 days in Pennsylvania.  And it's nice.  It's great to be back in our beds, to spread the noise out amongst multiple rooms and floors, to finally get to spend some time trying out our new gifts, and to take another look at all the Christmas photo cards that cover our fridge.

Then again, it's not so nice to be surrounded by baskets and baskets of dirty laundry, to stare at the Christmas decorations that seem so out of place but not have the time to take them down, to try to work around gifts that we spent multiple trips carrying from the car into the house, and but can't figure out where to put them all, to have a very fussy baby who starts hyperventilating every time he's not being held, to have a husband shut himself up in the office to write a paper and know this is going to be our life for the next two weeks, to be hungry and not have "any" food in the house, to make an exhausted grocery run on a Sunday night, when nothing is in stock, and to be told by the manager (who continued to walk by without stopping) that he doesn't know if they carry tahini, he's never even heard of it before.  (Well can't you look it up?!)  To hear the phone ring and see that yes, it's the same student that called you twice over break and is now trying to reach you at 7:50am on your first day back!!  To try to explain to my son, for the 7th time this morning that we don't have any oranges!  For heaven's sake I would have given you one the first time, or at least the second time, you asked if we did!

Ah yes, it appears that I've come down with a severe case of the holiday overwhelmees.  Nothing a little time and energy can't cure!  Unfortuntely, the time part is hard to come by these days!  But for now I'm just going to sit here, enjoying my tea and the fact that my 8 month old just leaned out around the furniture to make sure that I caught him smiling at me, and think about all the things I need to get done in the next few hours ... or days.

This is what I love about New Year's.  We've just wrapped up the season of Christ's birth and the world seems so full of promise.  A clean slate, a fresh calendar, motivated goals and big dreams... now if only my inspired self could find a way to get started!

More on our trip, holiday fun and 2011 goals to come ... after I do the dishes, laundry, return phone calls, make room for new stuff, fill several boxes up for the yard sale, menu plan, finish my book, revamp the budget and potty train Jack.  Okay, maybe I won't make you wait that long...