Things have been a little hectic with gearing up for the holidays. At the moment, we’ve yet to have both kids home simultaneously, and there’s a lot of traveling hither, thither, and yon over their break. It feels like the combination of a late Thanksgiving and organizing for these trips has made me more discombobulated than usual for the holidays. But that’s okay: we’ll roll with it.
It is extremely cold, and I am typically a barefoot person, but I’ve been wearing socks lately. Sometimes I wonder when I will reach a point in my life when I won’t run a few steps and then slide in my socks on the hardwood floor. At age 54, that time has not yet come.
I have some crucial updates. Just kidding. I have random, silly updates. First, since I posted Non-Toxic, I realized that there are other non-toxic men I should have included. I enjoy the pure silliness of the Savannah Bananas. It’s a whole team of Troy Boltons: cute boys torn between sports and theater. Enjoy some holiday merriment from them. Justin Neto is pretty much the 2020s version of Richard Simmons, leading people in simple dances, including tutorials where you can watch two different versions, the basic movements on the left and then a version with more pizzazz on the right. Very fun! And finally, the guy from @plumesofficiel plays music for animals who are almost always intrigued, and watching them approach and enjoy the music is a lovely little stress break.
Many of my plants are not enjoying the winter. A few of my favorites all went limp and tragic practically simultaneously. Since they’re all the same kind (actually the mom and two babies), but they were in different areas of the house and were getting otherwise the same treatment, I figured that the problem had to be the humidity or the temperature. And look at these before-and-after pictures of one of them:
I shut all three of them in a room with a humidifier, and both babies have perked back up, although big mama (you can see her in the foreground in the right photo; she’s big and sitting on the floor next to this bureau) is still recovering.
Meanwhile my jade plant had a sudden bout of mealybugs, which is absolutely gross. But I fought them off, and now I’m just vigilant about checking it every few days. I find it oddly satisfying. First, it’s nice to just take a break and look at my lovely plant, but then, when I DO see a little egg sac (I circled it in the picture below), I wipe it off with an alcohol-soaked cotton swap and it feels as satisfying as popping a pimple or removing splinter. I’m like, “stay away, you little f&*ckers!” There are so many times in parenting when you just have to sit back and watch your baby suffer through something, but as a plant parent, I can murder the threat to this particular baby.
And finally, as I’ve been continuing to avoid the news and look for nice, pleasant little diversions, I’ve decide that I’m going to actually try to post to Instagram, but with a focus on happy hobbies like the houseplants, embroidery, and anything crafty. We’ll see how I do, but I figured I had a limited opportunity to share Christmas crafts, so I finally did a first post.
Enjoy the holidays!
