Christmas (better late than never, I say)

Christmas kind of felt like a jumbled mess this year.  It flew by before I knew it.  Everything kind of happened all around the same time and it feels like I didn’t get to revel in it the way one should.  I don’t like that.  Can someone get a move-on with the “time slower downer” invention, please?  I’d buy ten.

I’m very glad Mia’s in school.  Where I might have fell short in helping her celebrate this year, her school family really picked up.  Sharing the excitement of it all with her friends and teachers was a new and wonderful experience for her.  I know she got her Christmas fill and that’s what matters.  She had her Christmas show in early December and was practicing all of the songs well in advance.  And we have more foam decorated Christmas trees, Snowmen, Santa Clauses and ornaments than we know what to do with.

For the Christmas show, the chapel was decorated beautifully and our Mia did really well.  She was front and center holding her little bell around her neck and singing her little heart out.  All of those songs that we heard non-stop weeks before were suddenly far less wearing now that she was performing them on stage.  Love that girl.

With scheduling conflicts, we were barely able to squeeze in a visit with Santa this year which was probably just as well.  Turns out your “free” visit with Santa isn’t so free.  The “photographers” were rude and rushy and when I told them I would not be purchasing their horrible pictures this year, they informed me that I would have to take my own pictures off of the red carpet…which would put me at a very awkward angle and about ten yards away from Mia.  So I went ahead and took my pictures front and center where I wanted.  I know, I know.  The careless disregard was pretty hardcore to all who witnessed.  But I have to get my rebellious nature in somewhere in life now.  I can’t go around punching boys and kicking in kneecaps anymore.  That kind of stuff will get a girl arrested once she’s of age.  So I was a little worried that I might get a Santa ticket or be thrown in a Santa holding cell, but nothing was said and all was well.  Couldn’t say the same for my pictures though.  We really weren’t feeling this Santa.  I wonder if he even knew how to smile?  He lacked the charm and warmth of the old Santa and he gave Mia..….fist bumps........

Maybe this is just my thought process, but I don’t think Santa’s supposed to be a “cool dude”.

I think we might skip the Santa visits from here on.  It was all just very cheesy, sterile and phony and all about running a business to make that money.  The magic just wasn’t there.  Not very Christmassy.  I’m afraid if I keep taking Mia, she's going to get wise to it in no time.  And I want her to imagine and believe as long as she can.  There’s more mystery and excitement in the anonymity of it all anyways.

I don’t know.  The older I get, the more and more I feel like Cindy Lou Who…or is it the Grinch?  The ads, the commercials, the craziness.  What does it really mean anymore?  Seeing how frenzied people get over stuff irks me.  Makes me feel like I'm watching a circus from the outside.  Not that we didn’t do our little share of gift-buying, but seeing basket after basket full of stuff – I just don’t know.  How much does one person really need?  Really?  It just seems like people have completely lost it now.  Is it competition or the feeling of “I never had it, so my kids will” that makes people go overboard?

To avoid being turned to the dark side, or in the case of the Grinch, the green side (ba-dum-tsss), it's nessessary to try and block out that part of it to keep that good feeling at Christmastime.  And the simple things are what do the trick.

Christmas songs – they remind me of my Grandma and Grandpa’s house.  She’d always have her little radio in the kitchen playing the songs of the season while we spent time together making food, playing card games, just talking.  The smell of their house, especially when food was cooking, was the single best thing in the world.  It will always be home.  And it will probably be part of my heaven.

The lights on people’s houses – the messier the better.  Seeing the things people come up with, from the unique and perfect to the truly thrown together – they always make me smile.  And they just make everything look sparkly and pretty.

Our Christmas tree all lit up and decorated.  It’s not a thing of perfection and it’s not something that would ever be featured in a magazine.  It’s messy and jumbled and many of the ornaments are older than I am.  Seeing it all thrown together - ornaments from my Grandmother and Great-Grandmother, ornaments that my Mom made out of clay, ornaments that me and my brother’s made, ornaments that were gifts, the plastic ornaments that Christopher and I bought before Mia came along when we had close to nothing, and now ornaments that our little girl has made - it’s amazingly beautiful.  I can just stare at it and completely lose myself in it.

My little girl’s smiles on Christmas morning.  I live vicariously through those smiles and remember what it was like for me when I was little.  I can only hope we’re helping her make good memories that she can always look back on in sentiment.

Receiving Christmas cards and hanging them up.  They make me happy and because I know their time is limited, I love to display them around our fireplace so that I can see them each day.

Good ol' Christmas movies.  From the old to the new, it’s one of the best things to curl up by a fire and watch a good Christmas movie.  Watching Laura Ingalls sell her horse to buy her mother a stove or watching the March girls give away their Christmas food - tears every time.

The best things I received this Christmas was not electronic or shiny or sparkly.  It was a snowman picture frame that Mia made.  One of the snowman's arms were on backwards and it held a picture of our little monkey wearing a Santa hat and holding a present under the school’s Christmas tree. 

It made me melt.  And my heart grew three sizes, for sure. :)