So Saturday I am all busy what with trying to unpack my pantry (because there is no room for food in my kitchen cupboards, there is only really room for dishes and Pyrex, and it would seem I have a strange surfeit of metal bowls, and plastic measuring cups (like 4 cup ones) and well, pyrex) and I am using these shelves that are on the way down to the basement as my pantry, since my landlord said it was no big deal. First I peeled this horrific contact paper off the shelves and washed them to see if I could get them clean enough to stock up, or if I would have to paper/paint them again first. Luckily, with washing they obtained that farmhouse chic I so covet, and I decided to load them up.

In the midst of my continuing unpacking my parents arrived, because they were bringing by a basketball for Elizabeth, since there's a hoop attached to the back of our garage (which is currently filled with all my belongings that don't fit into my new apartment, where they will live until it's warm enough for a yard sale).

And then Amy (my friend and former neighbor upstairs) showed up too!

I definitely thought that having 3 extra adults in the apartment with all the boxes that aren't yet unpacked made it seem crowded. Later my mom said it was largely due to the extra stuff, more than the extra people- which is good, because boxes get unpacked and put aside. Really! In this house I am unpacking! Before you know it I will have clothes in my actual DRESSER and hanging in my closet!

This is not normal for me really.

So whether it's because I feel so suddenly, entirely at home in my new enviroment, or whether it's because I like my new place too much to act exactly the same lazy and slobby way I always do, or whether it's because I am finally some sort of responsible adult or something (HA) but I worked on cleaning, and got almost all the boxes sorted out of my kitchen Saturday before our plans took us out and about, and I cleaned and moved stuff around in the living room enough to set up the Christmas tree.

And in the midst of this, instead of deciding that I would just not have people over, like EVER at my house because it was too much stress, I upped my ante and suggested that instead of the girls and I going out to Rogers to celebrate Christmas on 12/23, that my parents come over to our house.

That gives me two weeks to get things organized, down to the porch (er- um "foyer") and dining room. Which should be easy because they are less used rooms, but are also the parking lots for items I haven't unpacked yet. Books on bookshelves, the bin of fabric I resourcing for curtains and draperies...

But the crazy thing is that I ain't even afraid or NOTHIN! I figure, I can get that done, and gosh darn it doesn't that more than anything show my life is in fact different from my old disfunctional status quo?

I thought so.