You know, just some stuff and some things

They say the first day back to reality after vacation is the hardest. I’m not sure who “they” are, but I hope they’re right because it was a tough re-entry. And it didn’t help that I’d fully reverted to my full night owl self over Thanksgiving and didn’t fall asleep until sometime after 1 a.m. For those of you skilled in sleep math, you might deduce that means I got somewhere in the neighborhood of five hours of sleep. However, you’re not factoring in the eighteen times I woke up throughout the night with my brain swimming with the list of things I needed to accomplish in the light of day. It was just as restful as it sounds and what do those sleep experts know about the importance of REM sleep anyway?

So when P popped his head in the room to wake me up, I greeted him with a cheerful “NOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!” But I quickly put on my best morning face, which is basically a smidge more coherent than a drunken monkey, and poured Caroline’s cereal as I attempted to generate some excitement about the school day ahead. It must have worked to some extent because she smiled all the way to school and didn’t even attempt to tell me her throat hurt. Of course this might be because I basically told her that the only reason she could miss school between now and Christmas break is Ebola and to not even talk to me about any kind of cough due to cold.

Anyway, the day was full of getting caught up on a million things I’d neglected with more still waiting for me, grocery shopping because I threw out the last of the Thanksgiving leftovers and our fridge was beyond sad, and then driving soccer carpool. Now Caroline is finally in bed, the kitchen is clean and I’m settling into relax on the still somewhat white couch (as of this writing) at 9:42 p.m. I think I have about eight mediocre minutes left in me before I crash. Which is really a shame because when I was on my preferred night owl schedule during Thanksgiving, I was rehanging my drapes at 9:42 p.m. and full of energy and creativity. Sadly, the rest of the world – particularly public school – doesn’t work on my schedule.

So here are a few quick things I wanted to tell you about.

1. My couch and the pillows

Several of you asked about the white couch. May God have mercy on your soul. It’s actually a great couch that I ordered from a local store that’s now out of business back before I was pregnant with Caroline. It’s made by Lee Industries and I’ve always loved it because it has a little bit of a curve to it. Originally it was slipcovered in darker fabric colors (I looked for a picture and couldn’t find one. Of course I only looked for about three minutes and gave up, but still.) but those were worn out and I switched to white when Holly Mathis helped me decorate a couple of years ago.

And here’s the thing. I love the white. It’s gorgeous. But we are not a white couch family. I am not a person who is equipped to fret and worry about a couch and wrestle slipcovers back on cushions on a regular basis. If you are, then more power to you. I just need a couch that I don’t have to think about or worry about washing before company comes.

As for the pillows, here’s the Peace Love Santa Christmas Pillow

The elephant pillow and the pillow with words are both Sugarboo pillows from Carol & Company. You can find them (and so many other cute ones) here. The rest of them are either pillow covers I bought on Etsy or had made.

2. New Christmas music

My friend Shaun Groves has a great new Christmas album that just released yesterday. You can listen to some of it here and, even better, it’s only $4.95 right now on iTunes. Click here to buy it.

My personal favorite is his cover of Better Days. The line “tonight’s the night the world begins again” gets to me every time.

3. Advent books

Last year I loved Ann Voskamp’s advent book, The Greatest Gift

If you’re looking for a new tradition for your family, I can’t recommend it enough.

4. Hummingbird Farms

Don’t forget that you have until Friday to get 10% off any purchase from Hummingbird Farms. And you also get free shipping if you spend over $75. You can click here to see all their great products.

And now it’s about fifteen minutes past the original eight minutes I had left in me. So I’m headed to bed because rumor has it we’re getting our Christmas tree tomorrow. And by rumor I mean I told P that we were going to get our Christmas tree tomorrow. Otherwise known as the day of the year that trying to determine what constitutes a straight tree might lead to some marital strife.