Category Archives: Festivities

The mall in early November is glorious.

Posted on by

Ahhhhhh. I JUST finished the last thing on my “to-do” list for the week – other than writing this post – and I feel the way you do when you’ve been on your feet wearing super high heels all day, and you get home, and you take them off. It feels exactly like that. Ahhhhhh.

This week has been very busy with deadlines – baking, photographing, and writing – and preparing for next week’s book fair. I was kind of running a bit behind on Wednesday, what with one thing and another, but I thought if I buckled down enough Wednesday afternoon, I would be back on track. Wednesday at 11:52, not 3 minutes before I was leaving the house to pick up the boys for lunch, I got a phone call from the school. It was one of my children, who said he wasn’t feeling well. On further questioning, it turns out that he had thrown up.

CUE OMINOUS MUSIC.

I immediately went into batten-down-the-hatch mode, recording when each subsequent barfing episode took place (only twice more), spraying doorknobs with bleach and washing my hands until they started to crack. So far – SO FAR – no one else has gotten it, and the sickie recovered very quickly, but my to-do list took a bit of a beating, which is why I feel so relieved to actually accomplish everything I needed to this week.

Plus, did I mention it’s book fair next week? A stomach flu is really going to cramp my style.

Today I went to the mall to do some Christmas shopping, and although I’m not one hundred percent done, I’m pretty close. Before you say how can that be on your to-do list this week, well, it is. For my own mental health I need to have my shopping done by mid-November. After mid-November, the mall turns into the seventh circle of hell, what with the parking lot road rage, and the crowds and the horrible people, and the completely defeated seasonal staff.

The mall in early November is a very pleasant place to be. The feeling is festive and happy. People smile. The clerks and cashiers have not hit the “I hate everyone” wall that everyone who has ever worked in customer service hits. Some of the stores play Christmas music, but many are still on the regular radio stations, which had me humming along to “Brian Wilson” this morning. “I love this song!” I said to the sweet young thing at one store. “It reminds me of being sixteen again.” She blinked a couple of times, probably a little unsure what to say – maybe wow, that’s a long time ago, or, my mom likes this song too! – but she just smiled and said, “I like it too!” Bless you, child.

I have reached the stage in my life where, when asked by the cashier at Bath and Body Works if someone had helped me with my selections, I reply “Oh yes, that cute little girl with the blonde hair! She was very helpful.” CUTE LITTLE GIRL. She was probably twenty if she was a day and I just referred to her as a “little girl.” I think I’ve turned into my own grandmother, and next thing you know I’ll be asking for Isotoner slippers for Christmas.

I saw the sweetest thing today. I was behind an elderly couple on the escalator at The Bay, and the old man groped his (presumably, although not positively) wife’s bum. She smiled at him and said – wait for it – “Oh, YOU.”

I was so close to either dying from the cuteness or high-fiving both of them, but, of course, I did neither. It just made me so happy, and I hope it makes you happy too. Have a great weekend everyone!

Monster Mash Aftermath

Posted on by

So how was Halloween? My husband got home from his business trip on Friday, and so Saturday was a whirlwind of activity: in addition to the usual Saturday morning karate/ workouts/ grocery shopping, we carved pumpkins and the boys helped my husband put up the finishing touches in our yard. The front yard was filled with giant ghouls, skulls, and gravestones, as well as a number of animatronic motion-sensored ghosts, spiders, and shrunken heads. It was very spooky! In the words of a tiny Ariel who came to our door, “Your house is TOO SCAWWY.”

pumpkins

The pumpkins weren’t the scary part. Can you tell which is mine?

In fact, we only had eight trick-or-treaters, which is really average for our old-people street, but of the eight, one refused to climb our steps, and two of them cried in terror. A tiny, nervous Minnie Mouse accepted my offerings of a giant handful of chocolate bars, at which inopportune moment an animatronic spider and shrunken head began to descend, cackling loudly. Minnie Mouse burst into tears and started screaming for her daddy, while her older brother rolled his eyes at her and said, “It’s just PEE-TEND.”

The upside to only having eight trick-or-treaters is that when my kids go out, they really clean up. All the people in our immediately neighbouring houses dote on them, and so they came home loaded down with candy and chips. Oh! So many chips. It is TORTURE. The only reason I haven’t eaten them all is that the kids really love them too, and know how many they have. It’s hard to be a chip thief under those circumstances, which is good news for my pants.

Their haul was the best I’ve seen in a long time – a huge variety of candy, and no random handfuls of unwrapped peppermints like last year. Also no ecstasy or razor blades! I have always thought that was an urban legend anyway – who would spend money like that to put in trick-or-treat bags? – but then someone told me she once found a rolled joint in one of her kids’ bags, so I guess it could happen.

I related the story of the worst item I ever received on Halloween to my kids. I was about six years old, and dressed as a mouse. At one door, a man – who I now recognize was most likely inebriated – came to the door, laughing hysterically. When I said “Trick or Treat!” he told me to hold on for a moment. I was brought up to be very polite to adults, and if an adult told me to hold on a moment, I would wait. Wait I did, for several minutes until the man came back to the door, still laughing, and handed me a banana.

A banana! My husband, who grew up in a fruit-growing region, said the worst houses were the ones that handed out apples. But I say a banana is way worse. For one thing, there’s no chance it would survive the walk home, in a pillowcase filled with candy, bumping my legs the whole way. For another thing, it’s a banana.

After trick-or-treating and discovering no joints nor bananas, we headed to a party at a friend’s house. I had thought long and hard about my costume, and I was so excited about it. I drew a P on a plain shirt, and then coloured one of my eyes black with an eye liner pencil. A black-eyed pea! I was just overcome with the cleverness. Except that it was a total bust. Not one person got it, and in fact, it seemed like some people weren’t even sure if they should comment on my black eye. At first I wondered how shitty I look in daily life – I mean, how big are my undereye circles? – but then I realized that NO ONE WANTED TO MENTION MY BLACK EYE IN CASE IT WAS AN ACTUAL BLACK EYE.

blackeyepea

I AM A BLACK EYE PEA

“I tried to warn you it wasn’t a good idea, but you didn’t listen,” my husband said to me. “And now people are looking at me weird.”

I posted this photo and I got everything from politely startled comments about my husband to an actual hashtag #batteredwife. Now, I was shocked for a couple of reasons: a) that people would think that dressing up as a victim of domestic abuse was a socially acceptable idea, and b) that people would think that I THINK dressing up as a victim of domestic abuse was a socially acceptable idea.

In any case, it was a bust, and for the Costume Family Dance on Friday, I’m definitely digging out my non-slutty pirate costume or my witch’s hat, because I just can’t go through that again.

costumes

At least everyone understood their costumes.

All work and no play make Nicole scream at telemarketers

Posted on by

Last November 1, my husband took the kids to Walmart and for about $100, came home with a minivan-load of Halloween-themed exterior decorations. You all know me, come November 1 I’m really more of a Buddy the Elf girl, and so I didn’t really pay much attention to what they had purchased.

You guys, my yard. My entire front yard is filled with gigantic creepy scary things. There are 20 foot decorations swooping from the trees, across the grass. There are things hanging in every tree and shrub, there are severed hands and tombstones in my garden, there are skulls jammed alongside the withering elephant ears and hostas. Every time I look out my front window I have heart palpitations:

spooky

I have a feeling our poor mail carrier is less than pleased with having to dodge this on the way to the mailbox. Not to mention there is a plastic dead rose stuck in the mailbox.

In what can only be described as a brilliant move on the administration’s part, today is a PD day. What with the full moon, the lead up to Halloween, and the upcoming time change and subsequent darkness just after school pick-up time, it’s been kind of a shitty week. My husband has been travelling for work all week, and the kids (and me) have been missing him. EMOTIONS HAVE BEEN RUNNING HIGH.

Let’s turn this day around! I cheerfully said to the children several times this week, but really, it was ME who most desperately needed to turn the day around. MY GOD PEOPLE. Things hit a massive low on Wednesday afternoon; the boys were emotional, I have been crazily busy with work and volunteering, and I just wanted to squeeze in a quick workout on the elliptical trainer before making dinner. That’s all. I just wanted 30 minutes to be able to sweat out some of my frustrations while the kids told me about their day, but the crying outbursts of “I miss Dad!” necessitated me stopping the machine, getting off, and snuggling with them for a few minutes. Things had settled down, and I was about halfway through when the phone rang. It was marked Private Caller, which I don’t normally pick up, but because of my husband travelling I did.

Regrets. I have them.

A few months ago we had a nasty telemarketer who called for my husband, and left a name. “Oh, he knows me,” the guy assured me, “He’ll definitely want to talk to me.” Puzzled, I called my husband to tell him that Steve Fredericton called, and of course, he had no idea who it was. Later, when “Steve” called back, it was just some telemarketing idiot.

Fast forward to 4:45 on Wednesday afternoon, when I jump off the elliptical trainer and grab the phone. It was for my husband.

Me: He’s not home right now, may I ask who’s speaking?

Asshole on the phone: It’s Dave Draper.

Me: Dave…Draper? What number are you at?

AOTP: He knows my number.

Me, bathed with light and complete understanding of the situation: Really. He knows your number?

AOTP: Oh yeah. And he’s really going to want to talk to me.

Me: REALLY. Why? What is this regarding?

AOTP: I have a really great proposal for him. So, when can I call back?

Me, apparently snapping: You want to know when to call back? You want to know when is a good time? NEVER. NEVER FUCKING CALL BACK YOU MOTHERFUCKER.

Kids, listening to the whole conversation: Mom? Are you okay? Mom? Who…was that?

Believe me when I say I have never done anything like that in my life. Usually I have sympathy for telemarketers, and am polite: after all, it’s a crappy job and I imagine these telemarketers, just trying to put food on the table. I usually listen to all the spiels and politely say I’m not interested, thank you. But for some reason, this pretending you actually know my husband when you do not scheme just doesn’t work for me. Also, since I fell for it once I’ve been a bit more on edge.

Well, that was the low point. Yesterday was pretty bad too, since I was busy all day and yet somehow managed to accomplish next to nothing. I volunteered in Mark’s class for an art project, but it turned out that they really didn’t need volunteers, so my morning was wasted. Then I attempted to get some work done in the afternoon, but I had computer issues and all the photos I had taken didn’t turn out the way I wanted them to. The one thing I accomplished was a quick trip to Superstore while the kids were at karate. I was unloading my beans and pizza sauce at the cash register, as the fellow in front of me unloaded his items. He had a fresh whole chicken in a plastic bag, which somehow burst apart, sending the chicken right in my path. SALMONELLA FOR EVERYONE. It was not as low a point in my week as screaming at a telemarketer in front of my children, but it felt close.

Things can only go up from here, right? My husband is on his way home, I have all day to re-photograph some food, the kids are happy, and by this time on Sunday, I can start thinking about Christmas! Have a great weekend everyone, and Happy Halloween!

Lettuce pray.

Posted on by

This morning I got home from yoga a bit earlier than normal, at about 6:20, and this is what my back yard looked like:

May2015snow

One hour later I took “weed the garden” off my to-do list.

garden

Well, the snow’s stopped now and I’m sure it will be melted by the time I pick the kids up after school. I’d be more upset about it but really, we’ve had such a mild winter and a beautiful spring that it doesn’t seem to be getting me down at all. Maybe that’s because I have a new secret admirer.

Last week I received an email, from someone amiably named “Birky Tony”:

Hello,Am so sorry to have intrude in your privacy i sincerely like your profile picture on facebook it really caught  my attention. hope you don’t mind us knowing each other much better?.My Name is Birky, I’m from Austin texas.Am a 9 years widower,I live with my pet dogs.I am a Man with sense of humor,I am passionate and romantic,I have the fear of God in me, I have respect for my fellow human being.! It will be wonderful of you to send me a feedback if you want us to get along and know each other.I promise to make you happy and always put a smile on your face.Thanks and Cheers!

Regards,
Birky

It’s nice to know I have options, especially with regards to a person who has respect for his fellow human being, but apparently no respect for rules of punctuation and grammar. Any moment now, Birky is preparing to send a photo proving his masculinity, I just know it.

Did you have a nice weekend? I was much, much busier than normal, but in a good way. We all went to see Avengers: Age of Ultron on Saturday, and I found it to be even more of a snore than I normally find those types of movies. Zzzzz. I mean, really. All those men and the only one we see shirtless is Bruce Banner? THIS IS AN OUTRAGE. I enjoyed a) seeing Captain America in a tight t-shirt chopping wood, b) the on-screen romance between Natasha and the afore-mentioned Dr. Banner, and c) recognizing that Hawkeye’s pregnant wife is actually Sylvia from Mad Men. Other than that, I mostly thought of other things during the long, long movie that seemed to never end.

But I’m not the target audience, am I? It’s not like Joss Whedon is writing movies for people like me, but still, it would have been nice to see a little shirtless action.

And, of course, it was Mother’s Day, and I hope all you moms out there had a great day. Well, I hope everyone reading this had a great day, but you know what I’m saying. I got two awesome cards that I had spied in backpacks last week, a gorgeous blue Le Creuset canister to hold all my cooking utensils – huge improvement on the previous situation, in which I was constantly jamming in my numerous spoons and whisks and occasionally swearing about it – and a matching spatula! It was almost as exciting as last year’s giant bag of dirt, which is really saying something.

I say that without irony, by the way. I really was thrilled about my giant bag of dirt. The gardens are looking great this year already – and will look even better when the snow melts, I’m sure.

And speaking of gardens, my indoor grow lights are really paying off, and no, not like that. Look, it’s my first harvest!

lettuce

It’s mostly leaf lettuce, but there’s a bit of spinach and arugula in there as well. I’m pretty excited to plant more, because it was amazing. And it only took five weeks of concerted effort!

It’s the Ultimate Pi Day! And other fun topics.

Posted on by

I’m so excited for tomorrow; it’s the Ultimate Pi Day! 3/14/15!!! ππππππππππ all day long. Maybe I should write this entire post in Greek letters for celebratory reasons.

We are having a celebration of another sort tomorrow; it’s Mark’s birthday party. This afternoon is dedicated to party preparation: Jake is tasked with cleaning up the Lego pile in the basement, Mark is tasked with putting together candy-filled loot bags, and I am taking the boys to the nearest Dairy Queen to buy a Treatzza Pizza. This Treatzza Pizza has been the subject of many a conversation and much excitement and anticipation. I can’t wait to try the Treatzza Pizza! one of the boys has said at least twice a day for the past month. I’m not sure where Mark even got the idea for one; to my knowledge he has never tried such a thing. Marketing! It works, apparently.

Anyone else ecstatic that it’s Friday? Friday the 13th notwithstanding, I am pretty relieved that this week is behind me. The week we switch to Daylight Savings Time is the most exhausting week of the year. I love that several people separately sent me this article, “Alberta Senior Hits Pancake Circuit To Petition Against Daylight Savings Time.” I love this on so many levels. I love that people see someone petitioning against DST, and THINK OF ME. I love that I have something in common with this Alberta senior. I love the term “Pancake Circuit” and want to insert it into every conversation from now on. “I ate a lot of pancakes last year because I went to every pancake breakfast I could.” That, my friends, is dedication. I especially love the opening paragraph:

An 81-year-old senior whose body gets thrown “out of whack” by the annual switch to daylight savings time hit the pancake breakfast circuit to gather signatures to petition the province to end her misery.

She goes on to talk about how difficult it is for staff in seniors’ residences to rouse residents in the morning to ensure they don’t miss their breakfast. YOU DO NOT WANT THE OLD PEOPLE MISSING THEIR BREAKFASTS. No one wants light-headed, grumpy seniors. It’s the same way with the kids – I’ve had to coax my own early-birds out of bed every day this week, and they are usually the bounce-out-of-bed type. Will no one think of the children or seniors?

I’m telling you, this woman is my people.

Also this week was my second-to-last School Council/ Parent Association meeting that I chaired, and that I was almost late for. My husband had a painter in to do a quote for us, and it required so many decisions and colour swatches that I ended up running out the door to make it on time. When I got home later that night I had a list of possible colours, but no actual paint chips, so I had to run to the paint store to figure out what, exactly, the painter had recommended. Right now I’m waffling between a very deep avocado green or a deep blue for the kitchen and a bluish grey or darker bluish grey for the upstairs bathroom. We have settled on a dark rust colour for the downstairs bathroom, which will be quite a change from the current baby blue. On the one hand I’m very excited for the change. Changing paint colours makes the house feel brand new! On the other hand, I’m tired just thinking about having painters in the house, with all the mess and disruption, and possible “dog-brushing-against-wall-and-getting-all-painty” issues. Princess problems, I know.

Here’s some fun news: I buy all my various vitamins and supplements online, and so I get a lot of “20% off! Free shipping!” emails from the company I patronize. Yesterday, I got an email from them with the subject line, “Nicole, slim down for spring! Save 20% on all fat burners!” Then, today I received an email with the subject line, “Nicole, crank up your libido with help from Supplements Canada – 20% off plus free shipping!” WHAT ARE YOU TRYING TO TELL ME? This wouldn’t be so bad except for the newsletter I received in my in-box with the subject line “Why Your Husband Doesn’t Want Sex.” I swear, opening my email is becoming very damaging to my self-esteem.

Cherry Cherry

Posted on by

Sometimes, in order to get motivated, one needs to have a period of complete sloth, and that was me last week. I didn’t exercise. I didn’t work. I did the bare minimum around the house. Basically I spent a lot of time on the couch, with a glass of wine and this:

pioneergirl

Between my kids, husband, and mother-in-law, I received fifteen books for Christmas. My husband had wrapped them all but when we got an Amazon delivery on December 23, he decided he had enough of wrapping paper and tape and just handed me the book. It has essentially taken up every spare second I have had since then. I will have much to say about this – the Ingalls family saw much more scandal and poverty than one might think from reading the children’s books – but it will have to be at another time.

On Christmas morning, my husband handed me a small package, saying in a discouraged tone that he wasn’t sure I would like it, and that he did keep the receipt. It’s very unusual for him to be so unsure about a gift, since he normally bats things right out of the park. For example, this was in my stocking:

wine

Santa sure knows how to stuff MY stocking.

Anyway, my husband was uncharacteristically filled with insecurity, but when I opened the gift I couldn’t understand why. This choice shows how well he knows me!

neil

I’m not going to say it’s the greatest Christmas album ever, but it’s definitely close.

So I was mostly slothful and busy eating lots of snack mix and drinking lots of wine, but I had to haul myself off the couch on Christmas day, because I was hosting Christmas dinner. It was my very first that I hosted, and I think it went really well.

179

After all this relaxation and festivity, I woke up on Boxing Day with a bee in my bonnet. I was filled with my usual urge to rip down the tree and

hyperbole

But for reasons unknown, I had agreed to go Boxing Day shopping with my husband. Every year he takes advantage of the sales to purchase new suits, ties, and other expensive work wear. I had, for some reason – marital harmony, perhaps – said I would go with him while the kids stayed at home and played with their new video games. And I will tell you this: it was a huge mistake. For one thing, since Jacob closed its doors, every other clothing store means nothing to me. NOTHING. While my husband was busily fitting new suits, I was wandering from store to store amongst hordes of people who were foaming at the mouth. I wandered into Guess only to be completely shocked by the clothing. I wandered into H&M and wandered back out when I was confronted by the same black acid wash jeans I had in junior high. I was a person without a destination, which is not the way to Boxing Day shop, as evidenced by the stampede of people at Aritzia. In the end, I was bitterly regretting the one hour I spent at the mall, and by the time my husband was done I was pretty much ready to run home, just so I could clean the house.

The second we got in the door, I took off my “nice shopping clothes” and put on yoga pants, fuzzy socks, and an old waffle-weave shirt and began boxing things up. All Christmas-card glitter and dust was wiped away, the floors were washed, the bathroom scoured, the laundry done. It was, as always, a most satisfying project, Project End Christmas On Boxing Day.

And once again I will remind everyone that there are two types of Christmas Elves in the world, of which I belong to the latter category: 12 Days of Christmas Elves, and Advent Elves. We Advent Elves start Christmas festivities early. We are the ones who finish shopping in November, dig out our Christmas CDs the second Halloween decorations are put away, and fight the desire to tear down the tree at 10:00 am on December 25. 12 Days of Christmas Elves are the ones who keep their trees up into the New Year, who wrap gifts on December 24, and who think Advent Elves are insane. It’s okay! We think you’re kind of crazy too. We can still be friends!

As an important side note: the 12 days of Christmas START on Christmas. They do not start 12 days prior to Christmas.

In any case, around the Boyhouse things are pretty quiet this week. It’s terribly cold, so we are in hibernation mode: the kids playing with their new things, I’m enjoying my new books and clean house, and Barkley is just happy to have things back to normal.

172

How To Enjoy The Holidays Without Losing Your Mind

Posted on by

Is it me or is everyone insane right now? I’m not talking about all the sad things that are going on in the world – I will not talk about them, actually – but I’m talking about regular, everyday people who are so loaded down with forced jollity that they are ready to snap. If you have even one child in even one activity, you know that of which I speak. Why does the week before Christmas have to be packed full with six months’ worth of holiday festivals/ dinners/ parties/ concerts? I’ll tell you why; if even one activity decided NOT to have a festive December celebration, there would be complaints a-plenty.

Again, I know of what I speak. Our school does not have a Christmas concert – for the very good reason that we have a solid 25% Muslim population and another solid percentage of children who do not celebrate Christmas. Hey, that’s cool by me. Personally I would rather NOT have to book off an evening to see my children unenthusiastically playing the recorder, especially if it is at the cost of other children feeling badly about their cultural heritage. And yet, for all the years (FOUR) that I’ve been School Council/ Parent Association chair, I have heard complaints about this lack of a concert. People. There is enough to do. Don’t complain.

So this is why every dance school, sports club, extracurricular activity has a festive party, and this is why December becomes a gong show of show me your holly jolly. Even my kids’ karate dojo hosts a Candy Cane Shiah, which is fine, but if the kids had more than just the one activity I’d probably feel put-upon.

shiah

I seem to under, rather than over-schedule.

I get it. I totally do. But the thing is, I’m not feeling the stress. Here’s why: I have one thing planned this week, and it’s getting my hair coloured. I have secrets, people, secrets for alleviating holiday stress, that only kind of rely on wine consumption.

Nicole’s Secrets For Alleviating Holiday Stress

Say “Fuck It All”

Well, maybe not ALL. But fuck a lot of the stuff that you supposedly HAVE to do in December. Make a list of all the concerts, dinners, lunches, parties, and other festivities that you have committed to. Then cross off every single thing that isn’t an absolute necessity. You aren’t going to be able to cross off your child’s dance recital. You aren’t going to be able to cross off the Holiday Recorder Performance. Pretty much unless you are watching your child onstage, you don’t need to go. Potlucks, parties, etc., all those things are not necessary. Sure, if you want to, and you have the energy and a plateful of cookies you want to share, then go for it. But really, your friends will understand if you can’t make three parties in one evening. If you feel really bad about it, throw your own cocktail party in January or February, when nothing else is going on.

Let It Go, Let It GOOOOOOO

We all have things that are important to us around the holidays. For example, I have a friend who makes magazine-photo-worthy gingerbread houses (HI SUE) and another friend whose beautiful cookies could be featured in Oprah’s Favourite Things or maybe Martha Stewart Living (HI LIV) and that is fabulous. But if I tried to do that, I would end up in the bathroom with a bottle of wine, singing Santa Baby and crying. So I let the kids go to town on the gingerbread, with the following result:

 029 050 062 068028

It’s cool. I don’t mind gingerbread men with the word “BUTT” on them, or gingerbread men that have been decapitated and are missing limbs, all in the name of artistic expression. I don’t mind that the kids decided that it would be fun to have gingerbread men glued to the roof of the gingerbread house, with the illusion that said gingerbread men are sliding to their death. It’s okay by me.

The rule is, if it’s not super-important to you, don’t stress. Don’t even do it. If you feel exhausted even thinking about holiday baking, go to your nearest bakery and buy some cookies. PROBLEM SOLVED. But…

If It IS Important, OWN IT

It’s okay to want those perfect cookies; if it’s within your reach, do it! Enjoy every minute! For me, the Thing That Is Very Very Important is our annual Christmas card. It takes me a long time to choose the perfect photos, and to arrange them just so, and to get the wording right. Then I make my list and write out the cards, with little handwritten notes, and it is, to me, a Very Big Deal.

Now, here comes the rule for this one: What is Very Important to you may not be At All Important to someone else. This is also okay. This is freeing, in fact. You see, before I recognized this rule, I would have Hurt Feelings when I spent time sending off my carefully-thought-out cards and the sendee did not reciprocate. But realizing that getting a traditionally-mailed Christmas card is No Big Deal to some people is important. It means that I no longer send my card to those people. It might not be the Christmas spirit, but if I send a card, I want one back. If a person isn’t interested in the Christmas card exchange as an actual exchange, then I won’t send one.

There are some exceptions, of course. Certain family members will always get a card, so will friends that are ill or are otherwise unable to reciprocate. But other than that, I want to send my cards only to people who also value sending and receiving cards, rather than e-cards or a frantic email sent on Christmas Eve detailing why they haven’t sent cards again this year. It’s okay, non-card-sending people. We can say Merry Christmas another way. We can still be the best of friends, even if we don’t exchange cards! In fact, we will probably be BETTER friends, because I won’t have Hurt Feelings about it.

Delegate The Things You Hate

For me, the thing I hate is wrapping gifts. I am terrible at it. I have friends (HI REBECCA AND LYNDSEY) who love wrapping; they love their sparkly paper and ribbons, they love making plain boxes beautiful. Me? I’m always cutting the paper too short or too long, so I either have a paperless gap on a box, or a giant bunched up wad at the ends. The ribbon never curls and I need too much tape. Then my hair starts to fall out and I somehow get long red hairs randomly stuck on the Scotch tape. If I had my choice I would just stuff everything in gift bags but SOMEONE (read: my husband) insists on having rip-open-kind-of-gifts.

So guess who gets to wrap gifts in our house! My husband is very handy with the wrapping paper, but of course, I can only delegate so much. He can’t wrap his own gifts, after all, which brings me to…

Chip Away At It

My old boss, when we had a large trading position he wanted to get rid of, would say “Let’s just chip away at it.” When I have something I do not look forward to doing – gift wrapping, for example – I chip away at it. Ten or fifteen minutes a day of concentrated effort over a few days usually does the trick. That way I don’t sit, overwhelmed, staring blankly at a pile of gifts and rolls of paper.

Speaking of chipping away at things, here’s a great trick to make holiday baking super easy: make gingerbread or sugar cookie dough in October or November, and freeze it. Then take it out sometime in December, roll it out and cut into shapes, and voila! Easy peasy. Get your kids to decorate them with butt-related décor and everyone will be happy.

Shop Early, Shop Often

It’s too late to implement this now, but bookmark this for next year: start your shopping early. Swistle (HI SWISTLE) gave me the idea of buying gift cards one at a time, starting in September. It’s a great way to spread out the cost of Christmas, too. I also save my credit card “points” that swap for gift cards and use those for teacher’s gifts. This year I also bought a huge box of Lindor chocolates at Costco in October, and divided them amongst the non-main teachers for the kids – music teachers, etc. – and then I put them in brown paper bags that the boys’ wrote on, folded over the top, punched a hole in the top, and tied shut with a ribbon. Easy and somehow whimsical.

Look at it this way, the earlier you can finish your shopping – including online shopping – the more time you have to NOT be stressed out about gifts. Unless, of course, you are one of those people who actually like the mall in December. If you are, I salute you. You are stronger than I.

Hannah (HI HANNAH) mentioned this great idea: when grocery shopping in the months prior to Christmas, stick a few extra canned goods in your cart each time you go, so you are prepared for those holiday food bank drives. I know my kids tend to remember the night before they need to bring in canned goods, leaving me to dig through my cupboards and wonder if coconut milk is an acceptable donation, and where are all my chickpeas? It’s easier if you have extra beans or tomatoes that you can draw on.

Remember This Isn’t A Test

Unless you are actually having a magazine photo shoot at your house, there is no need to have the picture-perfect tree, lights, wrapped gifts, and food. Unless you have someone coming to your house and eating off your floors, your floors do not have to be clean enough to eat off of. There is no exam, this is not a pass or fail venture. So if you don’t make it to the mall to meet Santa, if you forget to move your shelf elf, if you have to leave Oreos instead of home baked cookies out for Santa, IT IS OKAY. Give yourself some love, pour yourself some Bailey’s, and remember – your family will appreciate a happy, relaxed mother more than a harried one that spent three hours that she didn’t have making sparkly reindeer food. You’re doing fine.