Almost Halloween!

Preparing for Winter
Well, it seems to have cooled off to a reasonable degree, which puts one in the mind of winter preparedness around the Pfannenstiel house. Winter prep tasks can be divided into three categories; the outside tasks, the inside tasks, and the party planning tasks. I do my best to ensure that Andrew does the first two, and I do the last one, which seems the most fun!

The outside tasks this year have been minimal. That’s mostly because we never got around to putting in a garden last spring and our great plans for a compost pile are still plans. But, Andrew put away the grill and all our outdoor furniture last weekend. He is also going to water seal the deck, a process I feel daunted hearing about. But he assures me this won’t take much time provided we get a few last temperate days.

Thankfully, inside tasks this year are also minimal. As I am now almost half way through my pregnancy, the semi-annual seasonal clothes sorting is rather easy. Nothing fits and so away it goes. All the turtlenecks came out, and I am down to scrubs, 1 pair of pants, and 1 pair of jeans. I have some nice big skirts I was planning on wearing, but I’m cold all the time, and I just can’t contemplate maternity tights. The thought of tight and maternity just makes my stomach woggly. So, it seems that I’ll be wearing 4 pairs of pants for the next 20 weeks.

This leaves us to the last and best fall task, party planning. As of this writing we are hosting Thanksgiving, a Christmas tree trimming party, and Christmas itself. As Andrew pointed out, the holiday choices for a young couple boil down to drive or host. Since my parents have no permanent abode, and I am doing my best never to go back to Texas where my darling brother lives, that leaves our place.
Thanksgiving is going to be a hoot. We have 8 people coming, and thanks to my aversion to all things poultry, we are skipping the turkey this year and having filet mignon with béarnaise sauce, creamed spinach, and twice baked potato casserole. With any luck, I’ll start a new tradition of turkey free Thanksgiving. Whenever I talk about my turkey free holiday, I seem to hear plenty of confessions of people who just don’t like turkey that much anyway. There have been many murmurs of jealousy of our having beef.

The tree trimming party is an ingenious invention of my Aunt Jackie. In return for hanging approximately a million ornaments on the Christmas tree, Andrew and I agree to provide food, drink, and if we are lucky, trombone duets with Art. People come, hang ornaments, eat too much, and leave quite merry. At least that’s the way it worked last year. We are hoping for a repeat.
All this planning has level little room for Christmas planning, but, I have no fear that such plans will be laid soon. But, with the cold weather upon us, and little to do outside, Christmas planning will take an afternoon of work, and a week of execution, and then it is on to 2008!