After Thanksgiving dinner we began to set up the Christmas tree and put out other holiday decorations. I hadn't thought about it until then, but we didn't have stockings for the girls. We knew it wasn't fair to hang stockings if we didn't have them for the everyone, so we waited a few days until we had a chance to pick up a few more. After dinner one night that week we put up all the stockings and I had my next realization: I had cross stitched our names onto our stockings and the ones we had picked up for the girls were blank. I decided I would cross stitch their names onto their stockings before Christmas. Friends, let me tell you that one decision nearly killed me this Christmas. For a whole month I carried some one's stocking, thread, needle, pattern and little scissors in a bag everywhere I went. I was determined the girls would have personalized stockings. I am not a girl who procrastinates, but I simply could not squeeze in the time to stitch names onto 5 stockings between Nov 25 & Dec 23. Thankfully everyone let me hole myself up in my room on Christmas Eve so I could finish the last two of the bunch. Now that is a lot of stockings!Jess is home for the winter break and it is hard to keep up with her. She feels she has to have some major activity going on every day; going to her friends house, shopping with so and so, stay the night here, stay the night there, have a friend stay over - the list goes on and on. Of course each of these requests comes in the form of a text while I am in the middle of putting out some fire or other at work. She gets very upset when a. I don't answer her immediately or b. I tell her something isn't possible because we have too many schedules to wrangle and too few adults with cars to make it all happen.
Due to a family crisis last week, we rearranged things and had Jess watch the little kids for a few hours on Tuesday and Wednesday. Since then, she has accused us of having had to babysit for us all day - every day and she should be allowed to have some fun since she has been working for us ever since she got home...I don't buy it.
She is also very fond of telling everyone they are being rude to her or asking why we are being so mean when she hasn't "done anything to deserve it." I finally explained to her that we are adults. It is our job to frustrate her on a daily basis. If we aren't frustrating her, then we aren't doing our job. She didn't like that explanation.
The 1-2-3 Magic is coming along - with everyone. The kids have some trouble with it, but quite frankly, so do the adults sometimes. There are times when it is nearly impossible to count the behavior and SHUT UP. I will catch myself in a tirade and have to walk away. Believe if or not, I counted Jess in a text last week. She started texting me about where I was and what I was doing and could she go over to her friend's house. I texted back "no". She wrote back "why". I pulled out the classic adult response of "because". I knew what was coming next so I waited for her response. She didn't surprise me, she came back with "why is everyone being so mean to me?" I summoned up my magic and texted her back with "That's 1" She waited a minute and wrote back "I'm sorry." and that was the end of it. I did a dance right there in the stocking stuffer dollar section at Target!
A few years ago Devon found Thomas snow boots on clearance for like $2 a pair. She picked up 2 pairs for us. Somehow we have managed to lose the right boot of both pairs. This does not bother Wyatt at all. He insists on running around in two left boots of different sizes.Last week I asked Jack what he wanted for Christmas and he said 'I want to be a bampire." He told me he wants "bampire teeth" so he can "scare people all day" cause he knows he won't be able "to go outside in the daytime to play on the swing set or in the park or in the hot tub." I was very grateful Christmas morning to find out Jack was still Jack and not a short bampire.
Christmas Eve was over in a flash. The children were nestled all snug in their beds when I realized we hadn't gotten on line to track Santa on the NORAD website, we hadn't baked or set out cookies for Santa and his reindeer. I had had a terrible day anyway so I sat there in bed crying until my sweet husband said "Let's wake up the kids and do all that stuff." So, we did. The little kids woke up but Abby & Connie refused. They looked at me and said "UH" like Frankenstein's monster. I let them sleep but Jack, Devlyn, Wyatt and I tromped downstairs. John was fast, the cookies were done in record time. I pulled up NORAD's Santa tracker website while the cookies baked and remarkably, the kids passed out as soon as their heads hit their pillows.
Christmas Day Jack could be heard running around singing "In the meadow we can build a snowman, and pretend that he is Possum Brown." Jess managed to catch it on her cell phone. Jack's delivery of the tune is quite amusing. He gets a bit jazzy at the end. John and I have been laughing for days.
I'm sure you all know we had a beautiful white Christmas. It snowed for three days here. Jess helped the kids get all suited up and they went out for fun in the snow. Wy got a pair of mittens from Santa. "Look! Look, everybody! My Fourth of July mittens! See, everybody! My Fourth of July mittens!" (OK - Wy didn't really say that, its a line from a Christmas show I did years ago, but someone out there is laughing - and I know who he is!)
I took this second photo from the warmth and safety of our cozy living room. Thank the Lord Jess is still kid enough to want to go outside and play in the freezing cold with children.
love and blessings to you all
The gang at owenland park
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