So, what's left on your Christmas to do list??

[handsfree]

I need to

Panic buy another present for my mum
Panic over what I'm going to wear on Christmas Day
Finish icing the cake (it's marzipanned already)
Clean the bathroom
Clean the kitchen
Make up the spare room bed
Finalise the Tesco order coming tomorrow
Get turkey and beef from Costco (dh job)
Make lasagna for Christmas Eve
Make pear and cranberry pies

It doesn't sound too awful but with a 5 and 2 year old constantly underfoot I'm getting nowhere fast!

A million other things that I've forgotten.....

Decorate the cake
Make mince pies
Change bedding and make up spare room
Clean the bathrooms
Feel pretty on the ball this year!

Need to go to the shops and get the last bits of food I forgot to buy, and buy a present for DD from FIL because he apparently can't manage to go buy a damn Elsa doll from the shop. Also need to get the booze, lots of booze.

Need to vacuum and mop the entire house today.

Tonight I need to prepare the potatoes for the potato casserole (boil, mash, add flour and leave in a warm oven all night - makes the potatoes sweeten up by some magical process)

Tomorrow I need to make the potato and swede casseroles, and maybe some Christmas bread too, and add some tar syrup to pickled herrings to make them tar flavour (mmmm tar) and finish wrapping the presents.

Christmas Eve is the day we celebrate so will put DD's stocking on her bed early in the morning when I go put the ham in the oven, then make persimmon sauce for the rice porridge for breakfast.

Wrap some presents that are left (about half of them)
Stick decorations on the Christmas cake (ds needs to be here to "help" me.)
Finish knitting ds's stocking
Wash my hair and try to make myself look presentable after being home sick all week
Pack all our stuff to go over to pil's house

Luckily I'm not hosting this year. If I was this list would be as long as my arm.

Wrap remaining presents that I should have done yesterday
Buy a couple of small bits for dh
Wash & change bedding (usual day for dc is Sat & us Mon but doing it Fri & Sat instead) plus usual washing
Make mince pies
Pre veg ect on Christmas eve
General tidy up

Oops forgot setting the table on Christmas eve to avoid all of the frantic rushing on Christmas day. I actually quite enjoy doing it on Christmas Eve and spending time making it look pretty.

Has he been watching nick jr between 7-8am by any chance? If so that's why he wants the aquabeads!

I'm cleaning the house today while dh is out and ds is still at school.

Then there's just an Asda shop which dh want to leave til Christmas Eve 😖 We've got the turkey though and lots of treat stuff from m&s so just need the veg etc.

And that's it, we can have Christmas!

Oh shit, forgot I need to buy elf hats to use as stockings as our ones have gone missing. Better write that down. If I can be arsed.

Make a loaf of bread and chop up to stale a bit so I carmaker the stuffing

Get the damn gammon out the the freezer

Separate the stocking presents into bags for the relevant DS

• Clean and tidy the house
• Change the beds
• Do a ton of laundry
• Food shop (not a lot to buy - we're being fed elsewhere over Christmas)
• Stock up the pet food/toilet rolls as we're nearly out
• Get several bags of crap that have been sitting in the house since the summer to the charity shop
• Get some wood logs for the fireplace (have to have a roaring fire Christmas Eve. 'Tis the law...apparently)
• Magic away the cold I can feel coming on

Currently nursing my second cup of coffee, I'm still in my pj's and I'm on MN. So I'm doing super. I feel burnt out. I've been really organised with everything Christmas related up to this point, but I just want to eat, collapse and relax now. The thought of having to fling myself in the shower and get going again is just so unappealing.

OSETmum ooooh, yes!

Wrap everything
Buy turkey

We're just us and the DC so no dressing up or anything needed!

Oh. And I should chuck away some of DD2s old toys....we're moving soon and can do without packing a thousand plastic parts from games and sets which are no more.

Do the ironing
Clean the house-not doing this until Xmas eve morning as the kids will trash it again
Sort out the toy cupboard in dds room
Tidy out the office
Buy some mozzarella
Prep the dinner on Xmas eve
Change beds

Think that's it.

I'm suffering from a chest infection (on antibiotics) and have been ordered to rest. I can't stand up for long without my legs going wobbly. We are hosting family on Christmas Day, but very little is going to get done!
It's sort of nice in a way, ok the house might be a mess (3 young children at home) and the laundry piled up but so what? It hasn't enforced un-stressing, I'm too knackered to care!
I've got a shopping delivery coming tomorrow and absolutely everything is pre-prepped or frozen. My eldest (10) has wrapped all the family presents and has had a whale of a time doing it.

I meant it HAS enforced unstressing!

I still need to make a homecoming dress for my daughter as she flies out to LA on NYE and she needs to take the dress with her. I won't have time between Christmas and NYE so it's got to be done before Sunday!

Haven't even started yet!!

Not hosting this year (thankfully) so my list isn't too bad.

Today:
need to do a load of laundry and get last load away
Clean kitchen
Run hoover over downstairs
Meet best friend in the village to present swap and pick up last couple of presents
Change bedding on mine and dp's bed.
Make orange jumbly biscuits for either my dad or bf (shortcrust pastry rolled out and spread with marmalade and a pinch of cinnamon and rolled like a Swiss roll and sliced to make spiral biscuits.
They're a bit salty/sweet and the marmalade goes all sticky. My dad loves them and bf loves anything with biscuit/chocolate)
Finish wrapping a small mountain of presents and finish writing cards

All with a poorly 3yo. He's going to be dosed up with calpol, wrapped up warm and put in his buggy for shopping this afternoon so hopefully he will nap not bloody likely

Tomorrow:
Finish whatever doesn't get done today and some general cleaning. Maybe another load of laundry.
Tidy ds's room and try to figure out where the small toy shop worth of stuff he will inevitably get is going to go. (some of his old stuff is almost definitely going to have to go /be put in the attick )

I made the stuffing this morning so that's done.

I'm MNing on my bed which is half made - just needs the duvet cover replacing.

I'm setting off later to drive 150 miles to collect DMum - doing the reverse journey tomorrow.

Collecting Morrison's order on Christmas Eve morning.

I've also left a list for DH and DD1 which involves a bit more bed changing and bathroom cleaning that needs to be done before DMum arrives.

Apart from that I'm done. All wrapped. Most of the shopping done. Booze in the fridge waiting for me to get home tomorrow. I've even managed to not eat all the stollen for a change

Wrap presents for dh and try to find a shop with ready rolled icing and marzipan!

Two presents to wrap that I bought ages ago and found under the bed.

Biscuits and trifle to make with dd1.

That's it! I'm not in charge of the food shop, house is clean enough, fridge and freezer are clean and pretty much empty.

Cleaners are due today so there's no cleaning on my list.

I must do a lot of packing though:
Kitchen stuff
Towels
My and DH clothes etc
A couple of dvds and board games
Extra candles and matches and my headtorch (Scout in me - cottage is remote and power could go in bad weather)

I still have quite a bit to wrap - but I can do that in the cottage.

I still have mince pies to make, but as the pastry is made, I can bring the tin and rolling pin with me to make them on site.

Do a shop - when we get there (no online options) but I have enough for the first night. (Gulp - it means a supermarket on Christmas Eve though - but at least I don't need turkey and all the trimmings).

Sleep, sleep and more sleep to get over my chesty cough.

(And no wine until Wednesday - when we are home again! Boo!!!)

Change the beds, do the big fresh food and meat shop (early hours of the morning)
Wrap a couple more presents
Watch Love Actually (again)
I think that's about it really. I need to make some room in the fridge to get wine and champagne chilled but that's a job for Christmas eve. If it's cold they can go outside in a cool bag, along with the soft drinks. We need to have a couple of freezer meals to make room for a few bits.
Oh, and I need some ranatadine.

Dye my hair
Clean the house a million times
Make mince pies for vegan mum
Make gingerbread house
Collect meat sat morning
Buy anything that doesn't arrive in sat mornings food shopping
Move all the presents from spare room so my mum can sleep in it.
Try and stop 4 yo twins from poking holes in said presents.
Iron kids new bedding and put on beds without them seeing me do it.
Iron tablecloths
Set table on christmas eve
Veg prep
Make mulled wine
Sample mulled wine
Mmmmmmmmm wine

Oh, and an alcohol run when we get there too....

I love hearing what people do ! Ironing bedsheets and table cloths ! It's a different world