Under Pressure

I was just sitting here with a cup of tea, in the quiet early morning light, contemplating life and the wonders of dawn while a little bluebird sings on the windowsill.

Okay. Fine.  You know me too well.  I'm typing this up at 11:00 at night with a glass of wine next to my keyboard and a husband snoring on the couch.  But can't we just pretend for a few moments that I'm one of those early bird people who are capable of functioning in the predawn hours? It's just sounds so much more impressive. 

Thanks.

As I was saying, I'm just sitting here in the morning light reviewing my calendar.  I checked to see what was going on this week and then turned the page to see what we had scheduled for next week.  I choked on my wine - I mean tea - when I realized that next week is Thanksgiving.  Which means...

I have five weeks left to make all of my handmade Christmas presents.

In a bit of a panic, I opened the handy, dandy, color-coded spreadsheet and schedule that I so happily created in September and then promptly forgot.  According to my projections, I should be finished with roughly ten of the eighteen items listed.

I've completed two.

I'm running a bit behind.

Procrastination, thy name is Mandy.

This is also probably why I'm not one of those morning people.

But part of that isn't my fault.  No. Really.  The sweet pickle relish that was supposed to be a gift ended up adorning our hot dogs and being mixed into potato salad.  And eaten on crackers. And spooned onto sandwiches.

It was just too good.

Which means I need to make more.

On the plus side, I work best under pressure.  On the down side, this means that I'm going to be a madwoman for the next few weeks.  My dining room will explode with fabric and Mod Podge.  My kitchen will be festooned with canning jars and labels. And my poor, poor family will be eating lots of mac and cheese.

Hold on tight, kids.  Mandyland's about to explode with craftiness.