Just a few things from this Christmas season SO FAR (’cause y’all know it ain’t over yet, right?)…..
–Playmobil packs their playset pieces in different plastic bags inside the boxes. If there are “people” in the bag, the bag has air holes. Just awesome, right? (Thanks to my oldest Aub who discovered this in the very wee hours on Christmas morning.) I really think that’s just brilliant. Love it.
–There was some weird stuff going on with the underwear this year. The thing in our family lore is that if Santa really loves you he will bring you underwear. (I was so hoping for some this year.) As Santa was getting ready to fill the Fella’s stocking, he realized that the underwear, five pair I think, came in a resealable pack. Uh, say what? ‘Cause you need to be able to reseal your underwear in the package they came in? All righty then. Also one of the pair that Santa was bringing to my oldest had a security tag still attached. Y’all. They were not expensive–I do happen to know that. And the still present tag did not trip any alarm systems. Short of taking them back to the store for the removal of said tag, we have no way of getting the it off. I wonder what the store will think when we go walking in with one pair of underwear with the tag still on them. Would you believe we didn’t walk out with them without paying to begin with? *sigh* I really don’t like it when things are harder than they should be. (I mean, seriously, a security tag on underwear? We’re not talking VS here…..it was a department store…..)
–Christmas Eve when we went to the candlelight service at 7 p.m., our Princess asked me where Santa was. (Aren’t these apps amazing–they can actually track Santa!) I looked and saw that he was in Germany and that he was expected to arrive in our area in five hours (around midnight). She immediately went into planning mode. “Okay, as soon as Evening Prayer is over, we need to leave and get home as quickly as possible. And I’m afraid we won’t be able to take baths tonight. We have to get in the bed quick.” Oh my. In the end she did enjoy the candlelight service, and everyone did take care of personal hygiene as appropriate. And they were in bed asleep before midnight. But it was still after 3 before Santa called it a night at our house. (It’s all about the magic, people.)
–On the way home from church that night, Princess and Cooter got in a conversation in the backseat about the naughty and nice list. They were starting to get a little concerned about which list they might be on. (Seriously, here at the very last minute? Where was this concern at the beginning of the school year? Last spring? Two weeks ago?) As they talked, our Princess took a deep breath as if to calm herself and said, “Well Santa Claus does forgive.” And Cooter replied, “Yeah, like God does.”
That right there. That’s why Santa/Saint Nicholas is still very much alive in our celebrations. Because you can never have too many folks who love you unconditionally–through good and bad, wise and poor choices–like that.
–Christmas morning I was about to unwrap a gift labeled “from Cooter.” He looked at it and said, “Well I don’t know what that is, so I can’t spoil it.” Yeah. He’s been the leak this Christmas. And the peeker. We set the tree up in a different room for the first time this year so we wouldn’t have to supervise the puppy around the tree and gifts. It worked, except for figuring in that Cooter’s snooping would kick in this year. He was peeking in bags and not completely sealed gifts. His spoiling surprises is why I didn’t have him wrap anything for anyone until as late on Christmas Eve as I could wait. Otherwise, it would have been, “Hey, I didn’t get you {insert what he DID get them here}.” Trust me, he’s done it. Sigh. There’s always next year, right?
–Some of our dear family friends wanted to share something that the sweet teenager didn’t play with or use anymore with our Princess. I brought it out after things had settled down. It was something that she couldn’t have gotten before or it would have given away what Santa was bringing. When she opened the bag, knowing who had shared it with her, she teared up. She put her hand over her mouth, and just stared in awe. “Mama, I don’t have any words. I love it. I am speechless!” I soaked in her appreciation and the twinkling in her eyes that wasn’t completely due to her tears, and I said, “Baby, when there are no words, a hug will usually do the job.” That’s a Mama-ism right there. I hope she remembers it.
–This was the year we used totes we had gotten from the GW Boutique for wrapping for the most part. Not for all gifts, but when we could, we did, which cut down on our trash quite a bit. And it also cut down on my stress level. As I was wrapping a gift (with paper and tape) that was more than just a standard box shape, I thought about the fact that the tag would include my littles’ names on it. Perhaps the recipient would assume that it had been wrapped by one of them. I could be okay with that. (Of course the littles might be insulted. Sometimes they wrap better than I do.)
Perhaps my most favorite thing of this Christmas is that all three of my children said at one time or another that this was the best Christmas ever. I am thankful for that. And they said that, not knowing that Santa had tucked back a couple of things (things they had asked for) that they didn’t get until later. That Great North Polar Bear had been playing with them you see, so they were delayed in arriving. (If you don’t know about him, check out JRR Tolkien’s Letters From Father Christmas…..it’s a great book.) Yeah, that’s the good stuff right there.
Merry third day of Christmas!
I Might Need A Nap 