The 12 days of Christmas

Very serious firefighters

It is 5:15 in the morning and I have been up for almost 2 hours. This does not bode well for the day ahead. Eleanor got up three times between 2:30 and 3:00 a.m., which doesn't really put me the relaxed mood conducive to sleep, but the real kicker was when our kitten, Alice, peed on her cat bed around 3:40 a.m.  Merry Christmas to me. So, in a nutshell, I have 12 days until Christmas, way more than 11 unwrapped gifts, way WAY more than 10 unwritten Christmas cards, 9 bottles of wine (this may not be enough), 8 boxes of ornaments still in the attic, 7 actual days to complete the homemade gifts I thought at one point were a really super idea, 6 cats in need of serious mental and emotional therapy, 5 stockings to fill that (despite starting shopping in October) I still am not done with, 4 hours of sleep, 3 crazy children who will be home with me for the 18 days they have off from school for Christmas vacation, and 2 dogs who take turns chewing up everything in my house, chasing the cats, and knocking my children over and jumping on them. If anyone would like to have the partridge in a pear tree delivered to my house in the next week I think I'm all set for my nervous breakdown now.

At the Audubon

After skating

On the plus side, this is about the only quiet alone time I have had since... well, I can't actually remember when, so from the perspective it is actually kind of nice. It does give me a chance to reflect on the wild holiday season we have been plowing headfirst into like British in the charge of the light brigade. On Thanksgiving we left here around 9:00 (only an hour late!) to drive to Andy's aunt's house in Connecticut. It is always fun to see Andy's mom's family, especially his grandmother who loves to see the kids. She did try to tell Eleanor a fairly lengthy (for a two year old) story about a friend she once had named Eleanor, but Eleanor stood there very patiently listening, or at least staring blankly at her. After a short visit we drove the rest of the way to Rye for dinner at my parents' house. We had a good time, and the kids had a blast with their Borzoni cousins. Unfortunately Eleanor had a hard time sleeping, so we ended up with all three of us on the queen size air mattress all night. Not the world's best sleep. Then out to lunch on Friday, load everyone in the car and drive all the way back so we could take the boys to their ice skating lesson on Saturday. (I'm going to put some videos of the boys skating on youtube because they are just so cute. I have been really impressed by how hard they are trying!)

I want Dora for Christmas!

Eleanor and Fraser at skating

The weekends since then have been a whirlwind of kids birthday parties, adult Christmas parties, and lots and lots of holiday preparation. I'm trying hard to be positive about the holidays this year, and not get bogged down by all festive holiday stress. I'd really like my kids to remember the holidays as a fun and relaxing time, and not a time when Mommy did a lot of screaming and throwing things. That is a lot harder than it sounds. On Sunday we went out to cut down our own Christmas tree. Fraser was thrilled. He loved to use the saw and helped Andy carry the tree all the way back to the truck. Hammie and Eleanor fell asleep in the truck on the way there and then proceed to cry and whine the entire time we were choosing and cutting down a tree (Hammie had a full blown fit when we wouldn't buy him his own tree to have in his room). That lasted until we got Candy Canes for all three of them on the way out. Then suddenly everyone was happy and thought it was a great time. It's amazing what candy can do. Yesterday the kids helped me put the lights on the tree before we went to swim class. This went moderately better than the tree cutting. There was less crying, but more arguing over who was really being helpful.

Happy 4th Birthday Hammie!

Of course we also had Hammie's birthday party last weekend (Happy Very Belated 4th Birthday Hammie!) so they were all overtired from that too ("When your children misbehave it is because they are tired. When other people's kids misbehave it is because of bad parenting or an innate defect of character"). Interestingly we had all kinds of food at the party that I don't usually keep in the house (chips, cheezit snack mix, scooby snacks, cake, candy, etc.) and you know what my kids have been asking for every five minutes since the party ended? Juice boxes. Kids are just so weird sometimes. I'm having a hard time accepting that Hammie is actually 4 now. We got out all his 4T clothes and suddenly he looks like such a little boy instead of my little toddler. Of course he is still the snuggliest kid I have ever met, and likes to climb up me and hang on like a monkey pretty much every day, so I don't think I'll get too teary eyed just yet.

Candy makes everything better

And speaking of teary eyed. I showed the kids The Little Mermaid a few weeks ago (the Disney version) and Fraser was crying his eyes out at the end. After first guessing that he was scared by Ursula, or felt badly that she died in the end, it turns out he was upset because Ariel had to leave her father to marry Eric and King Trition says "I guess there is only one problem left.... how much I am going to miss her." Fraser was devastated that Ariel would leave her father and he would be sad. Oh boy. Yeah, that was a whole can of worms I thought it best not to dig into, especially since I was standing there trying so hard not to start sobbing right along with him.

At least I have a saw...

And so, as it is almost 6 a.m., and my day is therefore about to "officially" start, it's time to get to work (no one told me the hours of this job were so sucky!) Today the boys have school and then Eleanor and I will pick them up at 11:30. We will eat lunch in the car en route to Princeton for their nature class (during which Eleanor and I will walk around the Aubudon and check out birds, sheep, squirrels and whatever else she finds interesting. I will also put on youtube the video I took of her walking down to see the sheep so you can enjoying her lovely singing too.) We will get home around 3:45, unpack the car, get the ornaments from the attic, eat dinner and attempt to decorate the tree while appearing happy and breaking as few ornaments as possible (there goes that 9th bottle of wine).

 "When can their glory fade? O the wild charge they made!", while mourning the appalling futility of the charge: "Not tho' the soldier knew / Some one had blunder'd ... Charging an army while / All the world wonder'd:".

CHARGE!

Carrying the tree