My world

This weekend, reeling from the worst anxiety attack I've had in a year and the elementary attack, should have been terrible. I had a mini breakdown about the loss of my grandmother (she passed earlier in the year and this is the first christmas without her; the last time we were all together outside hospice/funeral was last Christmas). I've purposely avoiding most blog posts/news/twitter discussions about the shootings, and I'm not going to talk about it here either. I live in a state of denial that is really the only way I can function. My son goes to kindergarten next year. That is all.

Despite the above, my weekend actually pretty much rocked. Friday night my mom babysat and we went out with good friends and had phenomenal food (Ceviche's). Because I'm not a food blogger (and didn't have a decent camera in the low light, who am I kidding) I didn't take photos although our waiter did allude to the dessert being perfect for Facebook photos. There was artichokes and mushrooms in goat cheese and oxtail and scallops and DUCK IN CHOCOLATE SAUCE and crème brûlée and sangria ... And fantastic company. I love my friends, man.

Saturday was a long, fantastic day. I was up early w Henry because he was snotty (and C had a hangover) and we made a good breakfast. C got a haircut and we went to a birthday party for a friend's son. We did some Christmas shopping and had dinner and fun with C's cousin, which it has been at too long since we did (non-holiday) with her. The boys LOVE her, we love her ... It needs to be more often, that's all there is to it.

Today my stress level was much higher. I'm not sure what it was, but everything was bugging me. I got almost all the wrapping finished, I defrosted the wine fridge (priorities, dude), took the kids for a walk. I did grocery shopping on my own (although I had a minor hissy fit when C suggested I do so). Tonight's advent activity was "eat dinner by candlelight" so we turned all the lights off except the tree, turned on the Christmas music and lit candles and had a really lovely dinner of spinach ravioli in pumpkin pesto w shrimp. Henry had crackers and Spencer had just the shrimp, but I didn't fight w them about any of it, and we enjoyed ourselves.

I'm going to try hard to keep my anxiety and stress level down this next week. We've been eating out a bit too much so I'm striving for dinner at home every night until Christmas but I have a pizza in the freezer for emergencies and I think I have the meals planned which helps the stress. We have three cookie-making nights ... Which we'll have to possibly rethink. We don't even eat the cookies so there's that. We have a few people left to get gifts for, but I'm pretty solid on my people and C can be forced to find something for his father (the hardest person on the planet to purchase for) if need be. I'm not going to stress.

I'm not going to stress. My holiday mantra.


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