Hallelujah. Holy Sh*t. Where's the Tylenol?


Christmas is rearranging half of your furniture and art to accommodate a tree and decorations that you will enjoy for 3 weeks.

Christmas is cleaning out the playroom and bookshelves and closets to make room for more things to fill your playroom and bookshelves and (eventually) closets.

Christmas is always having the radio tuned to that soft rock station you would never normally listen to that plays round the clock Christmas music, even though they are playing Last Christmas, Jimmy Eat World instead of the vastly superior George Michael rendition.

Christmas is listening to three song singing decorations belting out different tunes at once repeatedly interspersed with the train noises of the toy train circling your tree because your three year old just can't get enough and can't hear you begging for mercy over the joyous sounds of the season.

Christmas is fielding a barrage of questions regarding the logistics of execution, plausibility of this guy being real while, for example, monsters under the bed are not, and whether or not Santa is watching the writing of this letter and if so, why it needs to be written.

Christmas is hoping to hell you field that barrage of questions expertly enough to keep him in the believers camp for one more year not only because you have a younger one to protect from premature bubble bursting but also because you just can't accept that you have a child old enough to be leaning this way already.

Christmas is driving around the neighborhood really really slowly with one boy on your lap and the other one helping Daddy drive the truck to look at the spectacular results of your neighbor's decorating efforts and smiling broadly as your littlest yells, "Tismas lights!" at each and every house.

Christmas is tucking in your three year old each nap and each night of the entire month of December and having him tell you, "Merry Tismas Mommy" each and every time and even getting a "Happy Birthday" and "Happy Halloween" thrown in once when the day was extra fun and Christmas-y.

Christmas is having a ton of time off with no rushing or appointment keeping or deadline meeting so that you and yours can eat breakfast slowly and wear PJs until lunchtime and make the only agenda items for weeks be: be together, have fun, eat, sleep, repeat.

Christmas is doing nearly all your shopping on your iPad, in your bathrobe, at one store (Amazon, I'm looking at you) in about five minutes flat (after loads of careful thought and consideration, of course).

Christmas is spending the rest of the weeks before Christmas contemplating then searching for then wondering how you will take delivery in time of the perfect gift for that person in your life whose gift simply won't be found as a Prime item.

Christmas is Christmas Vacation, Home Alone, A Christmas Story, bowl games, and carefree empty calories.

Christmas is Irish Coffee, Bloody Mary, Moscow Mule, Malbec, Craft Beer, Coors Light, Hot Chocolate, Peppermint Tea, and lots and lots of water. It's Texas Trash, peanut brittle, Christmas tree cookies, ham, mashed potatoes, dinner rolls, random candies, black eyed peas, and lots and lots of sweat pants sporting.

Christmas is family and friends and cheer and beer and love and laughter and light and bright and merry and fuzzy and snuggly and lovely good times. It's overcommitted calendars and bickering and Santa's watching threatening and headaches and sugar crashes and bloated bellies and insanely crazy times.

And I love love love it all.




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