Family Invasion - Round One - Preparation

Mom and John are coming for their annual December visit tomorrow. This will be the 8th year in a row that we've been able to celebrate Sheela's birthday with them. They take us downtown for the night. We all go to dinner, then they take the kids back to the hotel while Sid and I go out. The next morning we get up early and grab breakfast in the Hotel and then walk down the street to watch the Neiman-Marcus/Adolphus Children's Parade. After the parade we will come back to the hotel for lunch and then head home after the crowds are gone. And this is just the beginning of a wonderful week of visiting.

Before this however comes the making of the house presentable routine. We were actually in pretty good shape this year as we'd just completed a rather thorough cleaning. However the family room was still torn up from the baseboard work, the stairs were covered in two weeks worth of things waiting to go upstairs, the game room was buried in clean, folded laundry that was never put away, the paperwork pile is out of control and the computers are only half reassembled. The majority of these chores were to have been completed last weekend at our leisure but I had a cold and slept through the weekend. Monday night Sid watched football and I finished another book (Bone Finder by Sarah Andrews). Last night we finally dove in. We accomplished a bunch but there is even more left to do and only one night to do it. Oh, and I started another book (Earth Colors also by Sarah Andrews). No pressure.