Holiday Rush

Everything has been insane around here. That's why I hate the holidays. Yes I'm a Scrooge, a humbug, a Grinch the closer to Christmas it gets. I despise shopping among the crazy feeding frenzy of gift buying that happens at the malls. Don't get me wrong, I love shopping, just not when the malls are packed with the holiday lunacy. I dislike standing in lines that stretch all the way back to the other side of the store, the decorations loose their luster and just look tacky and the holiday music most stores play continually from Halloween until New Years day make me want to buy a gun. Even with all that I still must venture out and endure the torture of the holiday mania (no one delivers groceries in my area any more!)... But I digress.

Unexpectedly to me, hubby had the day before Christmas off. I did not find this out until Tuesday so I was sorely unprepared for him being home that day. He assured me that him being home the day before Christmas meant that I would have the rare and sweet opportunity to sleep in on Wednesday morning. This is something I took to heart and made plans for. Hubby got off work early on Tuesday then headed off to visit a friend, the little people and I had a nice quiet, uneventful evening full of holiday specials. They went to bed with only one trip up the stairs for me to make threats of great awfulness to get them to go on to sleep. Hubby got home around 1 am and I chuckled to my self as I heard him lock the door and head upstairs to bed. I thought "and you will be getting up early with the little people... hehehe..." Bright and early as usual the little people burst into my room to wake me. Cabbage Patch yelling "Wake up mamma! Wake up!" I told them to go wake their daddy and close my door. The door closed and my eye lids followed shortly there after. About an hour and a half later I hear hubby being upset with the kids, the kids being relegated to the sofa for time outs and him grumbling about something, I figure it's time for me to get up and see what damage has been done as I figured the little people had ignored my command to wake their father. Now I want you to for just a moment remember that wireless commercial where the woman is saying "Why would I say 'Flour the children'?" and you see the aunt/babysitter/caretaker/warden sitting on the sofa with two children covered in flour. Something similar to this is what I see when I enter the living room. The little people are sitting on the couch leaving large white powder marks on my navy blue sofa. Cabbage Patch is so white she looks like a ghoul. The little people were in the living room with a bag of powdered sugar. Luckily the mess on them and the tracks on the carpet and sofa were about the worst of it all. Most of the sugar was in two bowls. *sigh* After vacuuming the living room and sweeping the kitchen it was off to the bath for the kids for scrub.

After baths and getting the little people dressed we fed them breakfast which we realized was a bad idea since it was far to close to nap time by then. Oh well. Hubby and I discussed gifts for his brother and father and made a list of things to get at the stores. Yes we would have to venture out into the shopping frenzy. We decided on making baskets of Mexican yummies for both and headed off to the stores. The first store was like a mad house. There were people everywhere. We got a giggle at one man who had obviously waited until that day to do ALL of his holiday shopping and had decide that he wasn't going to go to ANY other stores for it. His cart was so full he was having trouble seeing over it to push - he even had things stacked below the cart as well. It was comical. It took us an hour to get $5 worth of things and head to the grocery store. Somehow I managed to misplace the list in the car and after hubby made an initial search that was fruitless we continued to shop with out. We got everything and got out of the store in another hour - and we managed to get everything on the list save two things, one I chose to not get and one we forgot.

Back home and naps for little people. The cooking began. It was much easier than I had anticipated. Even the donuts for Chanukkah (which were the hits of the evening). We lit the candles that night (although I was a bit afraid I would spontaneously combust while lighting them I felt so greasy from frying all the donuts and stuff - yuck). The little people got Barbies for gifts that night, which they enjoyed quite a bit - then started fighting over the shoes and the dresses until I threatened to throw the dolls in the garbage if I heard more fighting... ahhh the holidays are so special.

When the little people finally were asleep, hubby brought in the Christmas presents and we sat on the floor wrapping them, I gave some of the Chanukkah presents up to be wrapped as well. I knew we wouldn't do Chanukkah presents on Christmas (hubby and I had an agreement, no Christmas stuff on the first and last days of Chanukkah and no Chanukkah on Christmas) and since the little people have worked very hard to be EEEEEVIL this holiday season, I ended up with more presents than days of Chanukkah left. He filled their stockings with stuff.

Christmas morning, I got up at 6:30 AM to get ready for work. I got showered and dressed (I ended up spraying to much curl stuff on my hair so it looked nasty) then waited for the little people to wake. The came scampering down the stairs around 7:45 AM. I sent them back up to wake daddy so he wouldn't miss the frightening toy frenzy soon to come. Hubby let them have their stockings while I got the camera ready (had to clear the photos off my card) - in the time it took me to upload the photos they had emptied their stockings and eaten half the chocolate - the area where they were looked like a trash heap! On to the presents. I sat in my recliner and took photos as they tore through the wrappings. It's kind of funny now that they are 4 (almost 5) and 2 and a half. Both of them KNOW that things in brightly colored wrappings are PRESENTS and they LOVE know PRESENTS much be for THEM. We did all of the presents (they didn't get all that much) in about 10 minutes as I had to head off to work.

Work on Christmas. My first hospital didn't have any babies to photo - I hoped this would be a trend and I would have an opportunity to get a nap before we all headed over to the inlaws to do Christmas with them. My second hospital was FULL of babies! Unbelievable! I got there at 9 AM and worked straight through until 3:30 PM. My commission for that day sucked - people just don't buy on Christmas. I got several sympathetic comments from nurses about having to work Christmas - this I found a bit amusing as I really didn't mind being Jewish. I volunteered to work and I got holiday pay, so the sucky commission isn't such a big deal. I got home a little after 4 pm after checking my 3rd hospital - which had no babies either.

At home hubby had expected me home by lunch time and had prepared a lovely lunch of smoked turkey, sweet potatoes, green beans, brussle sprouts and rolls. Yum! He had held off feeding the little people or eating as well in the thought that we would all have a nice lunch together. I felt bad that he had waited. I had declined eating at the hospital for free as I knew hubby would have a nice meal waiting (which is not normal for him, he generally 'cooks' a pizza for lunch on Saturdays). I ate lunch then headed for a short (much too short) nap as I was dragging.

Off to the inlaws for Christmas. The little people were thrilled to see their cousin. They were mesmerized by the Christmas tree and had to be told several times to keep their little hands off the ornaments. After about an hour of the kids playing we called them into the living room for presents. Cabbage Patch had the whole concept of presents down by now. She came running into the room and slid on her knees right up to the tree (wood floors) - it was hysterical. Sister-in-law sorted out the presents for each kid then they tore into them like old-ladies at a 75% off sale in Wal-Mart. I was amused for the first 30 seconds but started getting pissed with the little people as they tore paper from a package, looked at the package for 30 seconds then dropped for the next thing in line. Grrr... I swear it took less than 2 minutes for them to get through everything - I couldn't even keep track of everything that was there! At that moment, I was really wishing someone had given me the kid-sized dog kennels I had on my wish list. Then they all headed off to play again. In the aftermath I realized that father-in-law had ignored my please to not get the kids much and had in fact gotten them everything I had suggested as examples and more - DVDs (3 in all), several books, a Leap Pad Jr for Super Girl. He also gets the prize this year for getting the two gifts I would gladly douse with gasoline and light I hate them that much but the kids love dearly. These dastardly items are masquerading as books for Cabbage Patch. They in fact are toddler toys made by Satan! One is a Barney music book with a guitar attached that plays music - which is nefarious enough, but it does more. It plays the catchy little kid tunes in what sounds like electric guitar, it has a little button so they can play them note by note and a whaaa-whaa bar that is kind of funny the first few times. I believe this item has already 'disappeared' . The next is a 'book' - The Cat In The Hat book with buttons that make noise. This wouldn't be so bad if not for the voice of Mike Myers. Ugh.

We made it home extremely late (for the little people) after watching my pressie from hubby - The Pirates of The Caribbean! I love this movie! Johnny Depp *pant* *pant*. The little people slept until almost 9 am the next day - something I truly appreciated.

OK, enough for now... Bed time for me.