it's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

I have many a tale of Christmas woe. Who with children doesen't?

There was the year my sister and I were kicking and cursing at a Little Tykes pick up truck at 4 am. That was also the year of "WAY TOO MANY gifts". I was storing them in a house we had rented, but had none living in, it snowed and I had to keep driving back and forth at all hours of the night. In my pre Christmas delusion I was sure "there weren't that many gifts". I was WRONG

Then there was the year when I thought I was GOOD, I had one week left. And youngest was in pre school 4 days a week. My plan was to wrap all that week to avoid my usual Christmas Eve wrap fest. Who knew everyone in the house, including moi, would be stricken by a flu that would almost kill us. Needless to say the wrapping? Again my poor sister and I sat up all night.

Then my favorite? Because of cats and children, and the fact that I grow trees, so I am always the absolute last person on earth to put up a tree. I planned on putting up the tree and wrapping the weekend prior. Then a ton of snow fell in NY and the husband and I ditched everything for a weekend of snow mobiling. And I hurt my back...BAD. My poor sister arrives and has to assume my role, becuase I am useless. There is a picture of her somewhere hacking at the top of a too tall tree with a steak knife. With sap running down her arm.

It's no wonder she never wants to come to my house anymore, and gets twitchy when A Christmas Story is on. Because I insist we watch all 24 hours of it, it was usually on during our Christmas Eves from Hell.

Adios I say to those ghosts of Christmas past. NEVER again. We are once again, taking the week before Christmas and running away. The whole lot of us. When I told someone our plans she looked at me incredulous and asked how I could possibly do that? How was I ready for Christmas an entire week before? "Easy", I replied. I'm already done.

The few gifts are bought and wrapped, the tree is up, and as long as I remember to take the turkey out of the freezer, dinner is ready to be prepared upon my return. It took the kids until this year to accept the fact that the ridiculous amounts of gifts from Christmas' past were done. But really they would rather miss an extra week of school and go somewhere exciting than get a bunch of clothes anyway.

And this week I was in the mall picking up some flip flops for the middle child, and I almost got sucked into the "just one more thing" habit from my past. But I walked away. Because really, I don't miss it one bit. This is more fun.