Christmas

Oh, Christmas. I love the holiday. I really do. I love the fact that Jesus was born to save his people and now we celebrate his birth on December 25. I really do love it. I really do. And here it is, what always follows when I make that big of a deal of anything................

But, I do not like the stress, the pressure to buy gifts and give presents to people you sometimes really don't even care about. I don't like having to spend countless hours wrapping presents then having to run out at the last minute to pick up a gift for some random person that might show up somewhere and it would be embarrassing not to have anything. That is what I don't like about Christmas. And that is why I say that Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday. You get to spend time with all of the people you care about, just like Christmas, without any of that ridiculous pressure.

Christmas for our family has been a little less stressful the last couple of years though. Since hubby lost his job, we've cut back drastically on the amount of money we spend so Christmas has been a little leaner. That goes all the way around, with the kids and with other family members. Fewer gift issues = less stress = more enjoyment for myself. My shopping this year was extra easy though because I cranked it out online in about 90 minutes. Seriously. All of the purchases that I needed to make were made in one afternoon, thank you JCPenney and Walmart.

My gift wrapping is cut down tremendously since I don't buy anywhere near as many gifts as I use too and I don't wrap any of the gifts for the boys. So that's great. You'll never hear me complain about not having to wrap gifts. Ask some of the nieces and nephews. I'm pretty sure someone has receive a gift at some point in a grocery bag. I'm not ashamed. It's something I had to do. I will not explain myself to you.

It's not that I hate wrapping gifts. I really don't. I actually like doing it. It's just that I really like for my gifts to look a particular way, meaning lots of ribbon and curling ribbon and straight edges and such. It's easier now that gift wrap is coming with lines on the underside. All of the lines are straight and my boxes are centered. I spend large amounts of time curling ribbon. I told everyone that I spend so much time wrapping my gifts that they'll look great and distract from the low quality of the gift inside.

The boys had a great time. They got a lot of gifts that they wanted but have completely ignored since they got them. They have fought over each other's gifts. They got to see Santa and their cousins and best friends as Big BK would say. Hubby woke Big BK and me up at about 7 am on Christmas morning to announce that Santa had come. He'd eaten all of the cookies and drunk all of the milk. Big BK didn't hop out of the bed as he's not that kind of guy, even on Christmas morning. He did go down stairs and was thrilled to see his gifts. He got everything he asked for except the Craftsman farm. He didn't get that because I had no idea what he was talking about. Baby BK got plenty of stuff that he doesn't care about despite the fact that his brother sold him out to Santa the evening before. No, seriously, Big BK threw the baby under the bus, or the sleigh, as the case may be. He ratted him out, pretty as you please. For no reason as far as I could tell other than to get more gifts for himself. It didn't work.

Saturday evening, Christmas Day, we went to my OLDER sister's house for what we told the children would be a Christmas Party. (I stated it that way because she would prefer it if everyone thought I was older, especially since she's no bigger than a minute and I'm overset by gray hair.) Her children, my beautiful nieces and handsome nephew have a Wii and on that Wii, they have Rock Band-the greatest game ever created. To say that I love Rock Band would be like saying that I enjoy buying shoes or like to eat chocolate. It would be an extreme understatement. I LOVE Rock Band. It plays into all of my deepest fantasies. I get to pretend I'm a rock star and that I've got talent. When I'm playing it's very clear that I absolutely do not have any talent. But I'm just goofy enough and self-deprecating enough that it's fun for others to make fun of me. That makes me laugh and them and that is another one of the things I like to do. I, the two younger sisters, and the brother-in-law have decided to start a Rock Band rock band. We're going to perform only songs available on Rock Band with the accompaniment of the game. We'll travel and become famous, making fans everywhere we go and raking in tens of dollars. Well, as soon as we find baby sitters for the boys. If I'm travelling as part of a Rock Band rock band, I ain't changing diapers. And I've previously described potty training the little punk so you know that won't be an option for at least the next 1-16 years.

Just as a PS....

My baby now makes me look at him, he turns my face with his hands and says, and this is a direct quote...
"Ho, ho, ho."