Christmas Decorations Are Stowed

Well, that's that - until next year - and my back hurts, like it does every year. I have a weak back naturally, and so have to be very cautious about picking up or carrying anything heavy. For the most part, I never, under any circumstances, carry my older children. This is particularly vexing to them when I spend some time swinging their younger brother around (who is a good 32 pounds these days). Their whining quickly turns to grumbling when I remind them curtly, "It will hurt my back!"

The problem with the Christmas decorations is that years ago we made the mistake of putting all the decorations into obscenely large moving boxes. These boxes store very well in our garage on the overhead shelves we have dangling from the ceiling. You can probably do the math here, but let me spell it out:

big box + heavy decorations + overhead lifting = sore back

Every year, I think to myself that it would make sense to get smaller boxes so that the decorations would be more easily managed. Then I never do; the big boxes just work so well. We have some large decorations that don't fit well into smaller boxes, and it's nice to keep all the Christmas lights in one place (which makes that box the heaviest ...). Even so, we should probably do something about that, and move all the decorations into smaller boxes. But not this year ... the decorations are already put away, and my back is sore.