The Goose Is Getting Fat

(Please put a penny in the old man's hat!)

And we're officially full swing into Christmas preparations! We had booked our return tickets a while ago (during a seat sale, which included January 6th but had blacked out most of Christmas) but we just booked our tickets to Saskatchewan!

It turns out that I'm flying home a couple days earlier than Chris after all. We had planned that both of us would fly to Saskatchewan on the evening of the 21st, after Chris was done teaching, but it turns out that tickets on that day are really really expensive. And so we decided that I would fly on Tuesday the 18th, which saved us about $300. (The 21st is Chris's birthday and so I was going to wait and fly with him on his birthday. He has declared that he would rather have me pick him up from the Regina airport on his birthday and save us the $300. This sounds suspiciously like what happened on our second anniversary. It's Love: Frugal Style.)

Now that the tickets are booked and we spent an afternoon having a Christmas party with our church, we're starting to make real plans. But, at the same time, I'm trying to strategise how not to make too many plans this year. I'll be in Saskatchewan for 18 1/2 days. Of that, four of those days will be taken up with Christmas stuff, and four with being in North Battleford for New Year's. That's, then, 10 1/2 days in Regina. We'll also want to spend at least one of those days in Moose Jaw, because of Chris's brother and Ariann and Derek, and I just got in contact with my childhood friend Eliza who would love to see me if I'm in Moose Jaw sometime.

...which gives me 9 days of non-Christmas, non-travel days in Regina. And I don't want to go insane this year. I don't want to have the usual moment with Christopher, where we've suddenly realised how many plans we've made, and have realised how little time we've spent with our families, and feel completely overwhelmed.

And so this year I'm going to have to simplify and combine plans. I'm beginning that practice right now, before I go away. We've just announced that we're not going to Vancouver next Sunday for the church Christmas party over there. We've cut one busy item out of our calendar. And people here who want to see me soon will get to see me collectively on my birthday. The next step will be for me to learn how to manage my work time better too, so that I'm not feeling stressed all the time, and maybe I can have a relaxing holiday this year.

(I'm now reading this out loud to Christopher and asking him to hold me to this.)