Every year for Christmas, I do massive amounts of baking. And then I load up a huge plate with the results and take them in to my office, the better to foist off all these freshly created calories on other people. This year, however, I wasn’t able to do that, seeing as how technically we don’t really go to an office. So today I crammed a box full of cookies and fudge and copious amounts of bubble wrap, and shipped them off to the Benthic Creatures office in Illinois. *Someone* has to eat all these cookies, by golly.

While we were there, we also shipped off not only their Christmas presents, but also my niece’s birthday presents to my little sister, her husband, and her daughter. The woman behind the counter assured me that even with the basic ground shipping, they’d still get there in plenty of time before Christmas.

In retrospect, perhaps I shouldn’t have included the birthday presents in the package. After all, getting the Christmas presents up to them in the same month as Christmas, let alone *before* the actual holiday should be cause for a few gasps of disbelief. The fact that I’ve got my little niece covered before her birthday month even *starts* might cause my little sister to keel over in a dead faint. Or worse yet, start expecting me to be on time from now on. Hmm. Probably too late now to chase down the FedEx truck and get those back…

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After posting those pictures yesterday I really started to ponder the sad fact that our tree had nothing on top. So while attempting a half-hearted cleaning of the living room today, Richard found the green felt elf hat (complete with jingle bell on the tip). One piece of empty wrapping paper tube later, the tree now sports a lovely green elf hat in place of a star. This, of course, now opens up even more possibilities. Anyone know where I can get a giant (tree-sized) pair of googly eyes, and maybe a big toothy grin?

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During my usual emptying of the LitterMaid receptacles this morning I discovered that the toilet in the upstairs guest bath doesn’t flush. Not wanting Richard to miss out on this fun, I called him in while I finished up my task.

Turns out that the flushing mechanism has broken and will need to be replaced. It’s our very first our-own-house casualty! We put a towel over the seat to remind us not to use it, and one of these days we’ll have to get to a hardware store and get a new flushing assembly. After all, this shouldn’t be too big a deal, considering that we’ve already established our plumbing prowess by replacing a faucet in the bathroom sink. And besides, nothing says Christmas quite like a little home plumbing.

Tis the season for Holidailies!