Another day

Well.

So.

What happened around here this weekend?

I’m not really sure. But as I sit here with all my memories of nothingness, I’m reminded there was a time when I used to be better about jotting down little notes about funny/strange/bizarre moments that happened over the course of a few days so I wouldn’t forget them and have something to write about.

Yeah.

I should really go back to that system. At some point I have become overconfident in my brain’s capacity to remember various details.

Let’s see. Caroline’s class Christmas party was Friday afternoon and I apparently lived to tell about it. The actual party is never as stressful as all the planning that comes before the party and worrying about who’s bring the marshmallows to dip in the chocolate fountain and WHAT IF SOMEONE FORGETS THE STRAWBERRIES? THE WHOLE PARTY WILL BE RUINED.

You tend to lose perspective about the things that really matter when you’re homeroom mom. Which is why I may step down from my duties next year. Even though that will cause people to judge me because I only have one child and absolutely no job as far as they can tell and what could I possibly be doing with my time other than sending out thirty emails a week prior to Christmas vacation reminding people to bring strawberries and marshmallows?

Caroline was slightly disappointed by the chocolate fountain. She told me on Thursday that she really hoped it would be a chocolate fountain in the shape of a nativity scene and the chocolate would flow from baby Jesus. And I tried to manage her expectations by explaining some folks might think it a wee bit tacky, if not totally blasphemous, to dip marshmallows in a fount of chocolate springing forth from our Lord and Savior.

After we made it home from the party I spent the next two hours on the couch in an attempt to recuperate while Caroline played with some kind of Thinking Putty she talked me into buying. I don’t really know what qualifies it as “thinking” putty, but it glows in the dark and she says it responds to commands. I don’t know about that, but I can tell you that I kept finding it in various places all weekend long and EVERY TIME thought it was something one of the dogs had thrown up.

Friday night we had other plans that fell through and we ended up eating Mexican food with Mimi and Bops and then Caroline and I came home, took up permanent residence on the couch and watched The Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler. It was exactly the kind of low-key night we both needed and we were both in bed by 10:00. Just like I imagined Friday night would be when I was a teenager.

I immediately went to sleep but woke up to the sound of Bruiser barking at 2:00 a.m. Bruiser rarely barks unless there’s a reason. As opposed to Scout who’s totally deaf and will bark repeatedly as if to prove to himself that he really can’t hear the sound of his own voice.

Anyway, Bruiser was barking. And wouldn’t stop. So I sprang from my bed to see what was the matter and tore open the sash and the shutters (I was so going to do this whole Twas the Night Before Christmas thing here but I can’t remember it right now and I’m too tired to google it.) only to discover that Bruiser had treed a raccoon in our backyard. And my first thought was to wonder why weird stuff like this never seems to happen when P is home. My second thought was I have no idea what to do about this raccoon up in a tree and my obsessed dog at two in the morning.

So I just let the dogs sleep inside. It seemed like the easiest thing even though Caroline told me the next morning I should have just shot that raccoon out of the tree.

Yes.

That was totally going to be my second plan.

Shoot it with what? Her B.B. gun? A marshmallow shooter? Throw some thinking putty at it and see how that turns out?

On Saturday morning I dropped Caroline off at a birthday party for one of her best friends and finished up my Christmas shopping. Then we went to Home Depot because I saw an ad that announced all their outdoor decorations were 40% off. Which wasn’t true. SOME of them were 40% off, but nothing that I would actually want. Maybe I’m wrong but I don’t think when God sent his son to Earth that he intended for us to mark the occasion with a large lit bear that looks a little unnatural and freakish driving a train through our front yard.

(As opposed to the bears driving trains that look totally natural.)

And I tried to explain that to Caroline but she didn’t really seem to understand.

Of course this is the same child that was hoping for a chocolate fountain made out of baby Jesus.

Then Saturday night I went to a party while Caroline stayed with Mimi and Bops. I picked her up on my way home and we were both in bed again before 10:30. It’s a real rock and roll lifestyle we live.

And then Sunday morning we went to church.

The end.

But wait. Before you quit reading this fascinating account of our weekend with all the early bedtimes and raccoons, I just wanted to say that I may not post every day over the next two weeks. Or maybe I will. I don’t know. I can’t commit. I just really want to enjoy Christmas break and all the eggnog and merriment and fun times to be had without feeling the pressure to write every day.

So I may be here or I may not. But just know that if I’m not here, I’ll be back shortly. Or at least every few days because otherwise I’ll have way too many words to share and I’ll end up writing a bunch of 3000 word posts.

That’s all.

Well, apparently I wasn’t joking about putting up a few things I’ve seen on Pinterest that have intrigued me/inspired me/made me think about heating up my glue gun.

Or maybe have just made me swoon with envy.

And so I’m sharing a few of them with y’all today. Who knows? Maybe I’ll actually accomplish a few of these things at my house before Christmas is over.

Or maybe I’ll just think about it and call it a day.

Oh Pinterest. You make me want to be a better person.

1.  Christmas Button Trees

I think this is adorable.   And would be fairly easy to do if only we had some buttons around the house.

Well in the spirit of giving it appears that I have given the cold I had last week to everyone who lives at my house. In other words, P and Caroline are both terribly congested and desperately seeking Sudafed.

And did you know you can’t find real Sudafed anymore? Even behind the pharmacy counter? You can find HEB-fed and Wal-fed and CVS-fed, but not legitimate brand name Sudafed unless it’s the twelve hour Sudafed and that’s not the same. I like the small red 30 mg pill.

I realize this seems like I’ve put a lot of thought into my Sudafed consumption.

And I have.

Old drug rep habits die hard.

I think my preoccupation with pseudoephedrine products is an indicator that there isn’t much going on here right now. Unless you want to hear about how P woke up coughing up a lung last night and how Caroline slept in our bed and decided my body was the perfect leg rest.

Or maybe I could tell you all about the upcoming class Christmas party and how we decided to go with the snowglobe craft and the reindeer food. Because that is FASCINATING.

Oh, we also took P’s truck to the mechanic on Monday because it’s Christmas and his truck has a sixth sense about inconvenient times to leak oil or transmission fluid or to blow the flux capacitor so MERRY CHRISTMAS, P! I hope you love your new return thingy from the oil cooler. FA LA LA LA LA, LA LA LA LA.

Let’s hope that’s the gift that keeps giving.

On the plus side, I drove him to pick his truck up yesterday morning in thick, dense fog like something out of a horror movie. Wait. How is that “on the plus side”? Because it was 10:15 and we drove right by a Chick-Fil-A and I realized it was still early enough to get an order of chicken minis.

P got the chicken biscuit. But he tried one of my chicken minis and decided he didn’t like the texture of the roll. I’m not sure how our marriage is going to survive. Maybe some counseling. Or some intensive roll therapy.

(I am just making this up as I go along. I know it’s hard to tell.)

(I nearly resorted to showing y’all a bunch of things on Pinterest that I like. I bet you’re wishing I’d gone with that.)

(Don’t worry. If things don’t pick up here there’s a good chance that will be tomorrow’s post.)

Anyway, after we got home with the good as ten-year-old truck, I realized it was probably time to put water in our Christmas tree. Which is when I discovered, TO MY HORROR, that our tree has already quit drinking water. And there are still twelve days until Christmas. This doesn’t bode well.

But I tweeted my dilemma just like the pioneers used to do and several people suggested I add ginger ale to the water. And so I went to HEB, bought ginger ale and put it in the tree. I don’t know if it’s actually working because the tree still doesn’t appear to be drinking water as of this writing, but it does seem to have brought back some of its pine smell and the branches look perkier.

Or maybe it’s just a placebo effect.

Similar to what you get when you take Wal-fed instead of real, old-fashioned Sudafed.

So I haven’t mentioned that I’ve been fighting a bit of a cold because every time I mention I have a cold someone will inevitably leave a comment about how they’re concerned that I seem to be sick so much of the time.

When the truth is that I don’t really feel like I’m sick very much at all. But I do have an eight-year-old who goes to school every day which is the equivalent of living with a petri dish so I’m bound to come down with the occasional cold.

I’m just glad that I haven’t crossed over into Hazel territory at this point. I just have heavy congestion in my head that has made me feel slightly miserable for the last few days and doesn’t seem to respond to Sudafed unless I take upwards of 120 mg of it which is precisely the amount it takes for me to feel like my heart might explode out of my chest.

And now you’re probably wondering why I’m telling you all this.

I wish I knew.

Oh. I just remembered. Because of all the cold/sinus/aliens living in my head I haven’t been able to sleep very well. I’ll go right to sleep but then wake up at some point in the night when I can no longer breathe through my nose and my right cheek feels like it’s caving in. I’ve tried various combinations of Zyrtec and Sudafed and Benadryl and vodka, but none of has really worked.

Then I was at HEB yesterday because we were out of milk and eggs and bread and chocolate, and I walked over to the pharmacy aisle to buy some more Benadryl. I really wanted to buy some more Sudafed but I am certain I’ve reached my pseudoephedrine maximum allotment for the month and was afraid I might be arrested on the spot for running a crystal meth lab.

As I perused the selection of cough and cold medicines I noticed the Nyquil sitting there on the shelves. Good old Nyquil. We had some good times years ago. There was a time period during my freshman year in college when I took Nyquil every night. I have no idea why, but I know that it helped me sleep like a baby.

I think it was sometime after I began my career in pharmaceutical sales that I started to look down on Nyquil. After all, it’s just a combination of Tylenol, an old school antihistamine, and a cough suppressant. I left Nyquil behind in favor of newer, fancier cold medicines.

But yesterday I decided to return to my medicinal roots. I bought the Nyquil. Granted, I bought the Nyquil capsules because I haven’t forgotten the way the liquid burns when you take a shot of it. Last night I took those Nyquil capsules and I slept the sleep of angels.

I mean, I’m sure I still snored like a sailor, but I was too drugged up to notice or care.

And isn’t that the point of all good medications?

Of course I also spent much of today falling asleep on the couch due to the after effects but that seems like a small price to pay.

I really wish I had a point to end this whole post and tie it up in a neat bow, but I can’t think of one right now. So I’m just going to go take my Nyquil and call it a day.

Oh, in case you’re interested, I wrote a post about some of my favorite movie quotes over on The Pioneer Woman’s Entertainment section. You can find it by clicking here.

Hope you have a lovely day.

We ended up having one of Caroline’s best little friends spend most of the weekend with us. And on Saturday morning when the weather was rainy and miserable it became apparent that we’d need some sort of activity to get us through the day.

Or maybe just to get me through the day.

So I took the girls to see the new Muppet movie and I might have cried during the scene where they all sing “Rainbow Connection” because I am a big sentimental sap and Kermit holds a place in my heart.

But that only took up a couple of hours.

Which is when I decided we needed to go to Hobby Lobby to load up on some craft supplies. Sadly I’d forgotten that Hobby Lobby isn’t the best place to be on a Saturday during the Christmas season when everything is 50% off. But I persevered in the name of crafting. Just like Martha Stewart would do.

I could lead you astray and make you think it was all for the love of the craft but the truth is we were already there and it seemed pointless to leave. Plus I had a goal. A crafting goal.

It’s like I don’t even know who I am.

If you’ve been reading the blog for a few years you may remember that my very favorite Christmas decoration is the flowerpot nativity that Caroline made at preschool when she was three. Here it is:

I’m not sure there is a more accurate depiction of the night of Jesus’s birth. Look how bedraggled Mary looks. And her hair is a wreck. As well it should be after what she’d just been through. A donkey ride. Labor in a stable surrounded by animals. That drummer boy that wouldn’t quit banging his drum.

Pa-rum-pa-pa-pum.

And so I thought it might be fun to have the girls make new flowerpot nativities and since Gulley is now the teacher of the preschool class that makes flowerpot nativities, I called her to ask what we needed to make them other than the obvious flowerpots.

Here’s the list in case you’re interested. We found all of this at Hobby Lobby.

2 medium flower pots
1 small flower pot
acrylic paint
2 medium wooden balls (for Mary and Joseph’s heads)
1 small wooden ball (for Jesus’s head)
fabric for their head coverings
doll hair (or you can just color it in with a Sharpie)
roll of grapevine to create headpiece and staff
moss
silver pipe cleaner (for the halo)
hot glue gun or gorilla glue

We waited in the checkout line at Hobby Lobby until I thought Jesus might return before we made it back to the car and then drove home with our craft supplies. And a few hours later we had created two brand new flowerpot nativities. Here’s Caroline’s:

Sure it lacks some of the charm of Mary’s wide-eyed frightened look from the earlier version, but it’s still pretty sweet.

And if I’m feeling really ambitious and brave before Christmas is over I might go back to Hobby Lobby and get us some more pots so we can add three wise men and an angel.

And maybe even a drummer boy.

Pa-rum-pa-pa-pum.

Sometime last week P informed me he was going to the ranch for the weekend. Which didn’t come as any surprise because I’ve been married to him for fourteen years now. I told him that was fine with me but I’d appreciate it if we could go buy our Christmas tree at some point before he left and if he’d get the decorations down from the attic for me.

And he happily agreed to both these things.

Which is why last Wednesday was the day we went and bought our Christmas tree. Or as I like to call it “The Day of The Year that Tests Our Marriage and Makes Us Question the Whole Concept of TIL DEATH DO US PART”.

It all began when I called him on my way to pick up Caroline from school and told him I was going to Target after I got her. And he said, “But I thought we were getting the tree today”.

Apparently he only thought that in his own head because I was under the impression we were getting the tree on Thursday. But I am NOTHING if not flexible and I told him Caroline and I could forgo our trip to Target in favor of getting a tree.

So we drove straight home from school, met him at the house and we all drove to the tree lot. I realize a tree lot really lacks the pizazz and charm of a tree farm, but we live in South Texas and that’s our option. We have to buy imported trees. Don’t let the fanciness of that fool you. It’s a lot on a busy street with a festive red and white striped tent and some workers that I think spend the rest of the year traveling with those carnivals that you see set up in mall parking lots.

Once we arrived at the lot it became apparent that the pickings were slim. (I feel like that should be “pickins'” instead of pickings given the atmosphere.) The tree selection was sparse at best and filled with a variety of pine that I don’t believe in. (Not because I don’t think it exists, but because I believe it’s ugly.) I like a Noble Fir. Christmas for me might be ruined without a Noble Fir.

Caroline and P found one they liked and I agreed that it was a pretty shape but it was only six and a half feet tall. And what’s the point of having nine foot ceilings if you’re going to buy some sad tree that’s barely taller than your husband? Caroline kept trying to sell me on the tree and P finally told her to give it up because he knows that I will not be satisfied until we find a tree that might not fit through our front door.

Ultimately I asked the tree salesman if he had any other Noble Firs in the 8-9 foot range that I could see. And to his credit he dragged out three more trees for me to examine until I found a tree we all agreed on. I’d actually liked the first one he pulled out but P asked me why I wanted “a fat shrub” in our living room so that killed it.

We bought the tree and then they shook it and netted it FOR FREE. Oh yes. Buying a Christmas tree is a real bargain. But then the tree salesman agreed to let Caroline stand on the “shaker apparatus” (probably not its real name) and her entire Christmas was pretty much made at that point. She also may have shaken loose a few molars.

It was only after we got the tree back to the house and made our first attempt to put it in the tree stand that we realized it had a very crooked trunk. P met this discovery with some decidedly un-Christmas like words and went to get his drill to try to fix the problem.

And that’s really when the Christmas spirit took a downward turn.

Caroline decided she was bored with the whole process and ran to play with the next door neighbors. In the meantime, P began to drill a new hole in the tree and we had this conversation.

P: “Why did we even get our tree today? It’s not even December. It’s November 30th.”

M: “We always get our tree at the end of November. That’s when we bought it last year.”

P: “You don’t know that. How could you possibly remember that?”

M: “Because I remember you griping about it last year too. I like to have MAXIMUM TREE ENJOYMENT. I WANT THIRTY DAYS OF CHRISTMAS TREE.”

P mumbled to himself as we made our second attempt to get the tree in the stand and I commenced with my yearly tradition of telling him, “IT NEEDS TO GO A LITTLE MORE TO THE RIGHT. NO. OOPS! I MEANT TO THE LEFT. IT NEEDS TO GO TO THE LEFT. I THINK IT’S STRAIGHT. GET UP AND LOOK AND TELL ME IF IT’S STRAIGHT.”

He stood up from under the tree, stepped back to survey it and said, “THIS TREE IS ENORMOUS. THE STAR ISN’T EVEN GOING TO FIT. I DON’T KNOW WHY YOU INSIST ON GETTING SUCH A BIG TREE.”

Which is when I’d had it. “You know why I want such a big tree?”

“Why?”

“Because it’s the ONE TIME OF THE YEAR that I can make that dang antelope look proportional to anything else in our living room.”

And, lo, an antelope of the Lord appeared.

Except this year it’s a Santalope.

Ho. Ho. Ho.