Christmas Countdown

One more week until Christmas.

One. More. Week.

And there's still so much to do (sung like Olivia the Pig).  I have such a love/hate relationship with the holidays. 

I start the season off like this:

After weeks of trying to remember class gifts, class party supplies, bus driver gifts, buying all of the food, wrapping all of the presents in addition to my other parenting obligations, I start to feel like this: 

Then the Christmas party anxiety sets in: What if, at one of the many holiday gatherings, the complex cocktail of personalities explode, leaving not even the tiniest bit of dignity.  

I fear that only shards of candy canes and broken dreams will remain.

I started going to descend into a downward spiral of holiday anxiety, but decided I to stop myself because I honestly don't have time for a full-on meltdown.

First thing I did was remind myself of Agreement Number Two of the Four Agreements.

Holy hell, that is so hard to do!  To be truthful, it is damn near impossible on the best of days.  But I am really going to try to remember that when I am faced with an insane social schedule and not feeling very patient.

Speaking of an insane social schedule, do you feel the crushing pressure to overcommit to all of the holiday acitvities?  I know that I do.

I read this at Grounded Parent by Steph and felt better about honoring our limits as a family so we have a fighting chance to enjoy the holidays.

Maybe you feel conflicted about accepting change and letting go of things that no longer work for you during the holiday?  Or maybe you get hung up on creating the perfect holiday in the history of all holidays?

This post my Glennon at Momastary brought me totears.  Although our circumstances are different, her message about acceptance resonated deeply with me.

Thank you, internet, for being my rock during the Christmas season.

How are you doing with the holidays?  Have you found any inspiration that you want to share?

Me = Buddy the Elf + Clark Griswold + Marie Bamford’s Character from Target Commercials

It is Friday, and I still haven’t posted here yet!  There are a few reasons for the delay:

Thomas had surgery on Thursday to put in a second pair of tubes and his adenoids removed.

I am embarking on a totally new project that has required time for preparation.  Stay tuned on this one – I’ll make the announcement on Tuesday!

I have been totally preparing for Christmas.  In fact, I would be surprised if Santa doesn’t ask me to join his team as an official elf.

I am suffering from blog guilt – I haven’t been reading or commenting on blogs.  I have been neglecting Mommy on the Spot this week.  I have not been as active on my social sites.

But Christmas is one of my most favorite times of the year.  It is such a magical time of year that I am trying to be present for Marie and Thomas (despite the above list that didn’t even mention Harrington’s last minute business trip to California).

But in spirit of honoring my love of the holiday and my passion for blogging and my new obsession with YouTube, I have decided to use YouTube clips to describe me at Christmas.

It usually starts out with Harrington and I having a variation of the conversation like Ellen and Clark Griswald share (in which I could not find a clip – YouTube Fail).  It starts out with Ellen (Harrington) telling Clark (me) that her parents and his parents were going to be staying with them during Christmas. 

Clark responds, “All my life I’ve wanted to have big family Christmas.”

Ellen cautiously says him, “It’s just that I know how you build these things up in your mind.  You set standard no family event can ever live up to.”

Clark replies in disbelief, “When have I ever done that?”

Ellen lovingly reminds him by saying, “Parties.  Weddings.  Anniversaries.  Funerals.  Holidays.  Vacations.  Graduations.”

After I blow off Harrington’s cautionary reminders, I usually march ahead with my child-like enthusiasm and make lists of all the fun holiday things we will do as a family, just like Buddy the Elf (minus the elf costume).  (Note to self: consider finding elf costume for next year).

I then become so excited about Christmas I start to take form of Maria Bamford’s character from the old Target Christmas commercials.

Inevitably, I end up having some kind of meltdown in which I end up sounding like this:

Which brings us full circle with me being the female version of Clark Griswold.

Yep.  This is me at Christmas.

I promise to have a real blog post that will be announcing the new direction my new life is taking.  (Re: I am no longer in denial and signed on the dotted line).

How is your holiday season coming along?  Are you a Clark Griswald/Maria Bamford/ Buddy the Elf type of Christmas person?  Or do you lean more on the Grinch side (which, no judging.  I am a total Grinch about Halloween.)

Thanksgiving Weekend, For Real

I would like to preface this post by saying I love Thanksgiving. What’s there not to love: food, a parade, baking, family togetherness, getting ready for Christmas.



So when I was feeling quite agitated after this holiday weekend, I have come to the conclusion that I like the *idea* of holidays. None of these things that I enjoy about the holiday ever turn out the way that I think they will. I am the Clark Griswold of our family. I wrote a bit about this on my Macomb Patch post, but as I was writing, there was so much more that came to mind after I clicked the publish button.



In less than twenty-four hours of our family togetherness, Thomas was having a meltdown because Marie was encroaching in on his time alone with me. As we debriefed from his timeout, Thomas growled through clenched, “Sissy needs to go to school.”



Wow. On the bright side, he is very clear in communicating his feelings, right?



So the most obvious fix to this situation was to do a group project in which they would have so much fun that they would totally forget that they were feeling crabby with each other. Baking cookies seemed like a good idea. Everything was going great until I put in the flour into the Kitchen Aid Mixer, and Thomas put the mixer on full force. A fine film of flour covered the floor, the counter, and a bit on the pumpkin pies that were cooling. Nice.



Thanksgiving was good, for the most part. I went to my parents’ house to help them with turkey while simultaneously working on The Raw Chicken Dare. However, I walked into a power struggle about how to cook a turkey between my Mom and Dad. (My Mom has thirty plus years of experience, and my Dad watched an Alton Brown show). The bird was still frozen and my Dad already had his hands in the turkey so he just took the icky parts out. And I didn’t fight him on it because I froze. I just couldn’t do it. But I am no quitter so I took that herbed butter and was elbow deep in raw turkey as I spread it between the skin and the meat. I promptly washed as I was scrubbing for surgery. There was something distinctly more disgusting about that twenty-five pound turkey than a little chicken.



Decorating for Christmas has always been a favorite activity of mine . . . until Thomas thought the ornaments were toys and would. Not. Stop. Touching. The. Tree. I thought I was going to have a nervous breakdown, especially when he moved a kitchen chair so he could reach the ornaments I hid out of his reach (but obviously not out of his eye sight).



This turn of events escalated the power struggle between Harrington and Thomas to new heights. (Imagine hearing, “Don’t! Touch!” followed by Thomas making intense eye contact with Harrington as he reached for another ornament). I thought that I was going to lose what little mind I had left.



I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the intense discussions I had with Harrington about our vision of external illumination. I want lots of love and sparkle, and his vision has less . . . um, sparkle. But I think we are coming together on this since he bought more lights to fill in the wacky shaped tree in our front yard.



We ended the weekend with dinner with my mother-in-law, my sister-in-law and her family. It was a lot of fun watching The Babes play with their cousins. Since we were supposed to have a family photo taken, I worked really hard to make sure we all had nice, coordinating clothes cleaned and ironed. The picture never happened, but we all looked really cute, if I do say so myself.



So yes, I love the holidays. . . just like Clark Griswold.



Tell me all about your Thanksgiving. 

Because I would like to know that I am not alone.

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