oh my gosh, the christmas season is upon us. i can't believe another year has come and gone. it sounds so cliche, but the older i get, the faster time flies. i mean, it's been a month since halloween and it seems like only yesterday i was painting madelyn's face as a cat and forcing ella to wear her bee antennae. it's been almost a week since thanksgiving, and it seems like just this morning i was frantically rushing around walmart, finding the ingredients to make my 7 layer salad (which stressed me out, by the way...this is the first year i successfully prepared a dish for a family function. i'm officially an adult!)
so...back to christmas. this is the first year that madelyn has told me what she wants. last year, i desperately tried to squeeze out of the child any ounce of a clue of anything that she might want. nothing. so we bought what we wanted. same for ella. this year, it's a whole different ballgame. madelyn wrote a list a mile long, partially misspelled, filled with everything from hair bows and lip gloss to video barbie and orbeez (which forced me to search google to find out just what the heck "orbeez" are). ella also wants everything under the sun, but since she can't write yet, i just get to listen to her say "i want that" after every commercial she sees on tv. i did have to veto the fur real friend dog that you walk on a leash, pointing out that she has a real dog that she could walk on a leash if she just would, and that the one we have pees, poops, eats, and everything else. she didn't like my response.
being a parent at christmastime is tough. being a parent of multiple children is even tougher. not only is there the monetary factor to consider, (one almost has to take on a second job just to afford all the gifts his or her child wants) but have you ever gone to toys r us during the holiday season? oh my lord, it's miserable! and don't even get me started on black friday. i don't do it...i think it's the worst concept ever created. this year, my husband forced me out of the house and i almost died. i was one breath away from a major panic attack by the time we finally left walmart. fortunately, he rewarded me with hananoki afterwards.
then there's the whole "how much should we spend" saga. honestly, it doesn't matter how much you say you're going to spend, because it always ends up being more. either one child ends up with more gifts, so you buy the other something else to "even it out", or you get home and it doesn't look like you bought very much, so you go out and buy "fluff" gifts. you know "fluff" gifts...you spend $300 on one electronic, so you have to buy a bunch of cheap crap to create the illusion for your child that you got them a whole bunch of stuff. let's face it, no 3 year old is going to understand that the reason they only got 1 big present is because it cost more than 20 little gifts.
so christmas for parents is stressful. i think i've driven that point home. but wow...how rewarding it is! have you ever been woken up by an eager, ecstatic child at 4 a.m. on christmas morning? have you ever seen the excitement on a child's face when they realize that santa visited the night before? remember how fun christmas morning was when you still believed? these are the things that make it all worthwhile...the hundreds of dollars spent, the lines at the register, the constant questioning of "how many days until christmas?"
...but i still refuse to ever go black friday shopping again. a line must be drawn somewhere.
