yyyyyooooouuuuuuu baby!

Are you by chance hearing Mariah Carey’s voice or is my sweet pitchy voice now echoing in your head?  I hope for your sake it’s the former.

It’s a few days after Christmas which means…it’s Christmas Break for me!!!  Alas, I had such high hopes…or more realistically, delusions of what I was going to be able to accomplish on my time off around the holidays.  I envisioned a sparkling clean house with the Christmas tree lit up from the day after Thanksgiving, beautifully crafted, Pinterest-worthy ornaments adorn its branches while perfectly wrapped presents peek out from below.  Well, all that might have very well come true.  Just not in my house.  Instead, I found myself in survival mode since this is the busiest time for my husband’s line of work.  And so, I was forced to learn two very hard lessons.  I struggled and I didn’t always succeed but I had to strive and push myself to be

lazy and imperfect.

Laziness.  I have a 3 month-old and do you know how 3 month-olds like to pass the time?  They want to snuggle and since they really can’t see anything beyond 3 feet, they want to do nothing else than stare at you face-to-face…for hours.  I am usually guilty of hanging some dangling toys over her playpen and rushing off to do laundry/cooking/cleaning/wood-chopping/chicken-hustling.  But for Christmas, I gave my daughters the gift of laziness.  So I spent most of my days home with the girls sitting on the couch nodding my head in agreement as the 3 month-old babbled about her favorite onesie and singing “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star” and the “Alphabet Song” a thousand times over with my 2 year-old.  Hey, did you notice those two songs have the exact same melody?  I’m trying to teach her a little Guns and Roses “Sweet Child of Mine” just to add a little diversity.

Imperfection.  I’m a bit of a perfectionist and my “small” little projects can go overboard at times.  My husband is quickly catching on to my tricks as I try to fool him with the adverb “fast kind.”  Let’s just go take a few pictures of the girls “fast kind.”  Let’s just go through the outdoor closets “fast kind.”  Can you just scratch my back “fast kind?”  See how that works?  Two hours later, he’s figuring out we have different ideas of what fast is.  I’m super proud of myself for letting things go these holidays.  Yes, my Christmas tree didn’t get decorated until December 24 (yes, seriously).  It’s okay…I plan on leaving it up all of January to get the most out of it anyways.  Our Christmas card wasn’t exactly what I wanted, but, hey, at least we got one out this year!  Let me know if you didn’t see it and I can send you a link to our online family newsletter.  I meant to make cookies for the neighbors but then ran out of chocolate kisses.  There wasn’t enough cookies for all our neighbors so I wisely deduced that they couldn’t miss what they never knew was coming.  So, I ate the whole batch myself!  Man, celebrating  imperfection can be so freeing…and delicious.

It was still a pretty tiring month.  My husband worked all day and then had something every night of the week.  I was trying to wrap up the semester, finish up client sessions and take care and entertain two sweet little girls.  We never had a chance to go Christmas shopping so we decided not to exchange gifts this Christmas.  Instead, we focused on giving them something that might last a little longer and love on them a little stronger.  Our time.  I gave them a lazy and imperfect mom, who turned her shoulder on her laptop/dirty floors/unfolded clothes/unopened mail/to-do list and spent hours just hanging out with her two besties.  Did it drive me crazy to have a messy house and a sink full of dirty dishes?  Um, YES!!!  But I had to just get over it and deal.  Instead, we read books, sang songs, went for walks, and discussed our favorite snacks.  We made silly faces and drooping 2-foot tall tents in the living room.  And then I got to spend Christmas day with best 3 gifts ever…they’re cute, sweet, and all of them have great hair.  And you know what?  It ended up being the best Christmas ever!

So, from my family to yours…Merry Christmas!

PS.  The picture above is my sister’s house in case you were wondering why it’s so clean.  I said I had to deal with my messy house, that doesn’t mean I’m ready to put it out there for everyone to see. Yikes!

PPS.  I totally thought we agreed that this year would be a “no gift” Christmas.  Hmmm, until Christmas morning when my husband pulls out an Amazon box out of nowhere and plops it in my lap.  What?!?  I open it up to find a hammock!!  I was pretty surprised…although I have no idea where that came from…but I LOVE it.  So, then, of course, I had to reciprocate with a gift of my own.  A hug.  Yeah, a hug!!  He said he loved it but I’m not so sure.  The next day, there was an email from Scott sitting in my inbox.  No message…just a link…to his wish list. Is that a hint or what?