I can't believe it is almost Christmas! This holiday seems to sneak up a little faster for us since we actually celebrate Christmas with my family the weekend before Christmas (i.e. this weekend). On one hand it is nice since the holiday season gets to be carried on a little longer in our house, on the other hand the stress of the holiday season comes early and seems to stay late here too.

Since I haven't been organized enough to blog in a very very long time, this is what has been going on in a nutshell. Hammie turned one (amazing!) and we had a party for him in NY after Thanksgiving. It was cute and he seemed to have lots of fun (I think he especially liked the part when everyone sang to him.) When we came back from NY Hammie and I both got sick (woohoo fun) after about a week, just as we started to get well, Fraser got sick. Right now, for the moment, we are all healthy. It has been a good four days now, so I think this may be a new winter-health record. Of course as soon as everyone began to verge on good health we had the mother of all ice storms here and lost all our power. Luckily for us Andy's father and brother were kind enough to buy us a generator and drive it all the way up from New Jersey so we were really only without power for about 24 hours (there wasn't a generator left for sale in the entire state of Massachusetts last weekend). There are still lots of houses in town here that still don't have power though.

In other news, Fraser has hit on a new and exciting way to try to drive me out of my mind. He has apparently entered the great "Why?" phase, dreaded by parents everywhere. Now, secretly I always thought that parents who complained about how their children asked "why" all day were being totally unreasonable. I mean, sure it can get tiring to have to constantly explain things, but who doesn't want to satisfy the quest for knowledge of a curious little mind? Well, here is the part I missed in that assessment. Fraser's asking "Why?" has nothing whatsoever to do with actually wanting to learn anything, and everything to do with wanting to see how far he can push mommy before she snaps like a twig. To illustrate my point, here is a conversation I had with Fraser this morning:

Me: Fraser, I'm going upstairs to put clean sheets on the guest bed.

Fraser: Why?

Me: Because uncle PJ and aunt Bethany are coming this weekend and they would like to sleep on clean sheets.

Fraser: Why?

Me: Because it feels nice to sleep on clean sheets and the sheets on the bed now have cat fur on them.

Fraser: Why?

Me: Because the cats sleep on the bed.

Fraser: Why?

Me: Because it is comfortable and sunny.

Fraser: Why?

Me: Because the windows in that room face south and east.

Fraser: why?

Me: Because that is how they built the house honey.

Fraser: Why?

Me: I don't know, why don't you wait until Daddy gets home and you can ask him.

Fraser: Why?

Me: Why do you think?

Fraser: I don't know.

Now, imagine that conversation following each and every time you say anything during the day and you can imagine how close I am to the brink of insanity at this point. Throw a nice dose of Christmas stress on and it's a wonder Andy doesn't find me curled up in the fetal position under the dining room table when he comes home from work.

Speaking of Christmas stress, I had a nice little holiday meltdown last night after I finished wrapping most of the gifts. I'm not one of those people who enjoys shopping, and I find Christmas shopping especially stressful since I feel like I need to find a very thoughtful gift that poignantly conveys to the recipient my love and respect for them as well as my deep understanding of their individuality. This is a hell of a task when you are shopping at Target. So, pretty much every year I end up unhappy, with gifts that don't nearly convey the above message and, I suspect, one step closer to a bleeding ulcer.

So, as I said earlier, we will celebrate Christmas with my family this weekend and Christmas with Andy's family on Christmas. This year, there is an added level of complexity since I wanted to make sure the boys have a present from us on both "holidays." For actual Christmas this is easy since we are giving them, as a joint gift, a train table and train set. However, in the whirlwind of the season, for my family's Christmas I bought stocking stuffers for the boys and a few gifts for Fraser for under the tree (A thomas the train DVD and some big boy underwear) and NOTHING for Hammie to open under the tree. I couldn't believe I had done that. I searched through all the bags and double checked my receipts and there was incontrovertible proof that I had forgotten to buy a Christmas gift for my son. Several blubbering minutes later, after explaining to Andy that I am a horrible mother, Andy agreed to stop at toys r us on the way home one night this week to buy a gift for Hammie. Now, keep in mind that we are getting snow today and may get a foot of snow on Friday (and I don't know how to use the snowblower), Andy still needs to build the train table, and Andy has training for work tonight and so won't be home until late, and my family arrives on Saturday. Yeah for Christmas, the most stressful time of the year....