Tis the Season

Emily, Santa and Madeleine

Before I get going - NORAD launched on Deceember 1st. I spend all Christmas Eve glued to this site and suffering the mocking of every other adult in the house.

I honestly think this Christmas is going to be a lot of fun with the girls...if we make it! They are that age where magic is everywhere and they are old enough to comprehend it.

We did have some serious anxiety while watching "Christmas Eve on Sesame Street" this year. The point of concern was not how "big fat Santa gets down all those skinny little chimneys", but the Gift of the Magi allusion. Ernie trades Rubber Duckie to get a cigar box for Bert's paperclip collection. Meanwhile, Bert has traded in his paperclip collection to get a soap dish for Ernie's Rubber Duckie. Madeleine was in tears because both characters had given away their favorite possessions. Thankfully, the kind store owner, Mr. Hooper, comes to the rescue and returns both treasures. We are enjoying other Christmas classics on DVD, which is great as I have subjected Emily and Madeleine to the shows since they were 9 months old...nice they can follow along now.

Our lists for Santa this year are rather short. Both girls would like a camera. "The real kind that takes real pictures and is silver." Madeleine also requested "a purse like yours and full of money." Um, how do I request the same item? We had to have a chat about Santa bringing kids things that are for kids....not purses full of money.

Emily in pink and Madeleine in blue.

Madeleine in blue and Emily in pink.

The girls helped me put up our tree this year. We have an artificial tree - which I hate, but with traveling, I don't feel safe having lights on a real tree when we aren't there. Anyhow, this poor thing has been drenched in Bitter Apple Spray for three years running - the cats view the tree as a salad bar and the spray discourages this thought process. (We also have to seriously coat the stable from the nativity set and it always feels a bit sacrilegious...but so is letting your cat nibble on Jesus's place of birth.)

The tree came with lights on it and I added more over the years. I don't know why, but we have an entire layer of branches that are not lighting. So, with the "help" of two four-year-olds I went in search of the lighting problem. The end result was my erratic use of wire clippers to yank out an old string or two, two bawling preschoolers sent to their room (NOT the best time to be getting into everything in the house) and a 7 month-old kitten launching himself at my head as I rummaged through the branches which now have a funny smell (when your nose is right against them) because of all the apple spray. I sent out an email with an inappropriate title regarding Christmas and retrieved the screaming children from their room. Ho, ho, ho. Yep, the stuff of happy childhood memories!

Madeleine with her Salvation Army stocking from preschool. We did the shopping during alone time and Madeleine filled a stocking for a 15-16 year old girl.

Emily with her Salvation Army stocking. Emily filled her stocking for a 15-16 year old boy.

We do not usually have gifts under our tree because Santa knows we travel. However, this year the girls picked out ginormous bucket-o-games to give each other (There was no secret keeping and of course the first one to shop for a gift told her sister what was purchased....so the second bought the same thing, just with different characters.) So we are going to do a small gift exchange on Sunday in conjunction with Nikolaustag instead of lugging the games back and forth across the country - twice. Madeleine had alone time with me yesterday and Emily had it today. Part of alone time for each girl, was to buy her sister's gift and wrap it. Madeleine put Emily's gift under the tree about 11:30, Emily came home from school at about 12:30 and immediately the unwrapping began. Excuse me!!

Last night we drove through the Celebration in Lights in Newport News, which Madeleine and Emily thoroughly enjoyed. The Annual Williamsburg Christmas Parade was scheduled for tomorrow, but has been canceled due to the weather forecast (Sure, the year I buy chairs on clearance at the end of summer and they cancel the parade! I won't even mention the rain ponchos I bought at the Dollar Store today.) Thankfully, we have a friend's birthday party to attend tomorrow afternoon and our fingers crossed for a Grand Illumination party on Sunday evening. We have never braved the crowds to actually see the fireworks - but might try this year...

I finally have allies in my camp regarding Peeps. Emily and Madeleine have discovered the Christmas tree and snowman Peeps and think they are pretty groovy. While I am a Peep purist and believe there should only be chicks and bunnies at Easter and not these knockoff Peeps, I am happy to have the support.

On a couple of non-holiday notes...When my parents were visiting we went to a local museum and the girls were convinced they needed tickets. I told them they didn't as they were under 6. Madeleine looked up and said, "Yeah, and all of you are on top of it."

Emily has an extremely mild case of Brown's Syndrome that I discovered about one-and-a-half years ago when I noticed one eye was "funny" if she looked a specific direction. She sees a specialist in Richmond and the only implication is she does not have depth perception if she looks in an upper-diagonal direction to the right, while moving only her eyes and not her head. The doctor said this means she can't be a fighter pilot, but that is about it (Shockingly we are okay with this). Anyhow, if she looks in just the right direction she sees double. So, for light entertainment we went through a phase, a couple of weeks ago, where she entertained herself by giving me two heads on a fairly routine basis. At first I was worried the condition had changed, but then she informed me she could give me five heads (she can not) and I noticed she seemed to be enjoying my angst....another button to push.