Planning for the Holidays

As the fall months continue to march on, I find myself thinking about the upcoming holidays. I'm already starting to plan ahead in my mind. I'm thinking up shopping lists, holiday parties and events, getting cards made up and sent out, and decorating the house and a tree. Which reminds me, a tree should be a blast with 3 8 month old kittens! It will be a bit of a Christmas challenge no? I can't help it, I just LOVE Christmas! I like gathering with friends and seeing family. I love that warm, fuzzy feeling that the holidays bring to the house. Anyway, since I'm in this frame of mind today, I thought I'd share these instructions for gift wrapping that I received from one of my friends. Enjoy and everyone have a great day!

Wrapping Presents With the Help of Your Cat

1. Clear large space on table for wrapping present.

2. Go to closet and collect bag in which present is contained, and close door.

3. Open door and remove cat from closet.

4. Go to cupboard and retrieve rolls of wrapping paper.

5. Go back and remove cat from cupboard.

6. Go to drawer, and collect transparent sticky tape, ribbons, scissors, labels, etc.

7. Lay out presents and wrapping materials on table, to enable wrapping strategy to be formed.

8. Go back to drawer to get string, remove cat that has been in the drawer since last visit and collect string.

9. Reopen drawer and re-remove cat.

10. Remove present from bag.

11. Remove cat from bag.

12. Open box to check present, remove cat from box, replace present.

13. Lay out paper to enable cutting to size.

14. Try and smooth out paper, realize cat is underneath, and remove cat.

15. Cut the paper to size, keeping the cutting line straight.

16. Throw away first sheet as cat chased the scissors and tore the paper.

17. Cut second sheet of paper to size - by putting cat in the bag the present came in.

18. Place present on paper.

19. Lift up edges of paper to seal in present. Wonder why edges don't reach. Realize cat is between present and paper. Remove cat and retry.

20. Place object on paper to hold in place while cutting transparent sticky tape.

21. Spend 20 minutes carefully trying to remove transparent sticky tape from cat with pair of nail scissors.

22. Seal paper with transparent sticky tape, making corners as neat as possible.

23. Look for roll of ribbon. Chase cat down hall in order to retrieve ribbon.

24. Try to wrap present with ribbon in a two-directional turn.

25. Re-roll ribbon and remove paper which is now torn due to cat's enthusiastic ribbon chase.

26. Repeat steps 13-20 until you reach last sheet of paper.

27. Decide to skip steps 13-17 in order to save time and reduce risk of losing last sheet of paper. Retrieve old cardboard box that is the right size for sheet of paper.

28. Put present in box and tie down with string.

29. Remove string, open box, and remove cat.

30. Put all packing materials in bag with present and head for lockable room.

31. Once inside lockable room, lock door, and start to re-lay out packing materials.

32. Remove cat from box, unlock door, put cat outside door, close door, and re-lock.

33. Repeat previous step as often as is necessary (until you can hear cries from cat outside door.)

34. Lay out last sheet of paper. (This will be difficult in the small area of the toilet, but do your best.)

35. Discover cat has already torn paper. Unlock door go out and hunt through various cupboards, looking for sheet of llast year's paper.

Remember that you haven't got any left because cat helped with wrapping last year.

36. Return to lockable room, lock door, sit on toilet, and try to make torn sheet of paper look presentable.

37. Seal box, wrap with paper, and repair by very carefully sealing tears with transparent sticky tape. Tie up with ribbon and decorate with bows to hide worst areas.

Label. Sit back and admire your handiwork.