Merry Christmas!

Tis the Season for Packages on Your Doorstep

Look what the UPS man brought us me!!

Can it get any better than this? My favorite food. At my door step.

Life is sooo good.



Check it out. Little red crinkly things. LITTLE RED CRINKLY THINGS! With my favorite food. It does get better.



Thank you Miss Tracey. You made my day!



And be sure to check out Tracey's review blog so your kid can get this excited on a regular old weekday too. Who knows? You might even win the cool Squeeballs Nintendo DS game giveaway she's doing right this very minute. You know, if you want to ruin Jacob's day and keep me from winning it.

I Wish I Lived in Iowa Today

So I hear ya'll are having a blizzard....

We had one too. Last Friday. In Houston. It was cold. The Christmas party I'd been looking forward to for months was cancelled. Schools dismissed early. Milk and bread flew off the supermarket shelves. The local networks ran a constant feed of breaking snow news all morning.



If you look very closely, you'll see my boys through the near white-out conditions. This was at it's very worst.

Seriously, though, Houston got some snow last week. Twice I looked out the window and saw huge falling snowflakes, I think you Yankees call them "flurries". Places west and north of us got a little accumulation too. We. Did not. Too close to the coast, I guess. Too warm for anything to stick. We. Were very disappointed.

I used to live up north. I twice missed school the entire month of February due to snow and ice and then some ice and snow. One year I drove home for Christmas across the southern part of Virginia through the Appalachians with the radio announcers telling me if I didn't have anywhere to be not to venture out. My car spun five circles that day. I made it home though. I still don't know how. Dear Mr. Channel 2 Guy, what I witnessed THAT day was a white-out. There was no white out here, but thanks for staying positive.

I chuckle a little when I watch Texas prepare for snow. It's sweet, actually. When I was a northerner I took for granted every year that it would snow. I knew we'd get a day off eventually. Non-sticking flurries were old hat. Accumulation meant shoveling and the thought of driving anywhere in that would evoke grumbles from all around. Here in Texas, EVERYONE gets excited for snow. Any snow. Or even sleet for that matter. It just so rarely happens.

Yes. We were disappointed to have no tiny snowman. No weak snowballs. But we revelled in our ten minutes of flurries. Because that's all we could get.

I'm thinking of all you blizzard survivors today. Been there, done that. Just not in a very long time so I am quite jealous. Be safe. Stay warm. Enjoy your piles of snow for me.

And I'll enjoy my 65 degrees and sunshine for you.

The Santa Saga

*Read quickly because I'll be erasing this soon. My kid knows how to log on and access my blog. And he can read, dammit.*

Before we started a family, Derick and I discussed how we'd do holidays. Basically, all the holidays would be spent with my family since his family doesn't really care and we would not insult the intelligence of our children by introducing them to imaginary figures such as The Easter Bunny and Santa Claus. I mean, what decent parent LIES to their child?

That was before we passed St. Nicholas in the mall with our eight month old baby. That colicky, unhappy baby who lit right up seeing him sitting there all ho, ho, ho jolly and stuff.



So we figured, eh, he's little, we can do it this year.

And then we remembered my sister's kids, well, they also loved Santa so we kept it up, you know, to keep peace and harmony in the family.

And then the second child came and, well, how unfair would that be to let the oldest one enjoy Santa and not the youngest one, I mean, we are all about the fairness.




And the third one came, and although Santa's lap is quite full, we couldn't deny her either so here we are. For a family that wasn't going to do Santa, we sure have done up the Santa. And the Easter Bunny too, but that's an entirely different story.



But. The kids get older. And smarter. And they start to listen more. And then Mommy starts to panic.

So Jacob goes to a Christian school and most of the families there have chosen as we once did not to celebrate the secular themes of the holiday and instead focus on the true meaning of the season. There's a reason for the season? Really? I kid, I kid.

Anyway, these kids are starting to talk. In the past month, my son, my tiny baby son, has come home feeling so very sorry for three different boys who say they do not believe and he fears they will wake up with nothing on Christmas morning. He wants to buy them some Legos so they'll have something under the tree. Isn't that sweet?

While walking through the Wally World last week, one nasty old bitty had the loudest phone conversation about whether or not the person on the other end of the line should tell her child THERE IS NO SANTA. I bumped her a little with my cart. Did I mention I HATE listening to others talking on the phone. Go home. Talk there. Bah.

And now Target has this stupid ass commercial on all day where the dad gets upset at the mom when she unwraps her big screen tv and goes on and on incessantly about Santa not realizing there's a recession and Mom tells him that Santa knows how to shop.

Um, yeah. My kid. He gets innuendo. Who'd a thunk?

I see him standing there watching it. I see the gears moving in his head. I watch him stop what he's doing to catch again fifteen minutes later. The gears....still moving.

Why do that Target? Everytime I see it, the less I like you.

My kid. He doesn't ask any questions. I think he already knows the answers. It's sad really.

Sometimes I regret our decision to just go with it.

Then I see the delight in their faces when they see Santa every year.

And clear a path away from the fireplace.

And leave cookies and reindeer food and, for the past two years, a gift, bought with his own money because Santa needs a present too. FYI: Santa's getting a Lego Santa keychain. For the sleigh keys. Or the workshop. Whichever.

Santa will bring everything my kids have asked for this year. Even the very expensive Lego set he can't really afford. We're going to do it up this year. And we're going to enjoy every minute while we can.

A Helpful Hint

If you find yourself in a salon and you notice your stylist smells a tad bit like stale beer and a funny kind of smoke and if she happens to say "I think I did it right?" when giving what should be the world's easiest hair cut....

Run. Take the hair cover smocky thingie with you if you must.

Trust me.

I am hoping Santa brings me a wig for Christmas.