Category Archives: Holidays

AKA: travel.

Moving On

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Okay, so lets be honest here. Who, in their right mind walks away from the November/December months riding on a blissful holiday high? That’s right. No one. I don’t care what kind of pious or abstinent life you lead, there is no way you can honestly look back at the previous two months and not want to be all, LATER DUDE! And its not even like I’m trying to get all Bah Humbug, and whine about the same inane things that everyone bemoans (I’m Broke! I’m Fat! I’m Hung Over!). I’m just sayin’. If the holidays ran year round we’d all be dead by the age of 7. (Throw in a couple holiday-adjacent birthdays and it automatically shortens to 5.)

This year was our rotation to host the holiday extravaganza, which meant it was up to us to make sure everyone was tended to and cared for so as to minimize the boredom, hurt feelings, foot pounding, over-stimulation and general dramatic flair. Oh, and make sure the kids were happy too. If I were to rank it on a scale from 1 to 10, with 1 being someone pitching the Christmas tree on the lawn in an egg-nog-fueled rage, and 10 being that we all shared in a group hug at the end, I’d say it was probably somewhere around 7 – being that no one cried in the presence of anyone else and everyone seems to still be on speaking terms with one another. I shall proclaim it victory.

It took a full-scale global recession for everyone to finally stick to their “we’re keeping it simple this year” proclamation, and although our kids were showered with gifts aplenty, we are – overall – getting much closer to a manageable scope of gift giving. At first glance, you probably wouldn’t have been able to tell, considering all 12 of us sat down to open gifts at the same time – then multiply that by 6 or so gifts per person, then multiply THAT by the fact that the kids had somewhat patiently waited all morning and until AFTER breakfast. If we had opted for the one-at-a-time gift opening method we would probably still be sitting there – and/or one of the kids may have exploded.

Somehow, we all managed to make it through.


(note: roughly 6 minutes, with audio)

Because we are stupid can’t leave well enough alone, we had decided to undertake the task of moving the kids into separate bedrooms the first week of December – unleashing a project I am certain will never actually end. Currently, there are clothes piled on the floor, and framed pictures stacked in corners of every room. Now has come the realization that we don’t have ANY decent furniture for Porter’s bedroom other than his bed a giant toy pit toy box. We have set up a makeshift card table and I bought a lamp to, you know, make it look respectable. Other than that we are on a quest for a bookshelf. And as per usual, based on our findings so far, we are about as likely to find one locally as we are to get Porter to deviate his wardrobe. (I’m pretty sure he is eligible to set a world record for wearing the same outfit for the most consecutive days in a row.) Thankfully, as we began the rearranging process we were able to convince him that we could throw away the last of the contents of the diaper shelf and have successfully entered into 2010 without a single Pull-Up of any kind. Boo. Yah.

We are all now back at work and school, and Stella is now officially a 1st grader. The realizations of this shift continue to reveal themselves to us: Homework is no longer an activity, but rather a requirement. She won’t have an official 1st grade school picture. We need to begin saving quarters to make-up for the year we just lost in saving tuition. It wasn’t until the last moment that I realized that I had to actually prepare for this as another 1st day of school exercise. Let’s just say it wasn’t quite as big a production as it was the first time around. I managed to get a couple of photos, but that was about it.

stella

stella

stella

By this point you have probably figured out that we have basically rolled into this year with our usual pomp and circumstance. Nothing is dire, but nothing is dull. There is a term they use in the clinical world of doorknob touchers where they either refer to someone as neurotypical or non-neurotypical. As you can imagine, we utilize these adjectives quite often around these parts. As such, I think I am going to coin my own household term by saying that overall, this season was pretty much Walston-Typical®

The Pumpkin Pilgrimage

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Last weekend was our annual trek out to the Blue Lake pumpkin patch. Turned out everyone I know in Humboldt County had a similar plan, and I could hardly take two steps without running into someone else I knew. I guess once you have lived here for 17 years these things begin to happen.

This year the Bakers joined our group, and I honestly and truly tried taking photos. Really, I did. However, it became increasingly difficult considering that our Team Pumpkin ran non-stop in opposite directions the entire time and it was all I could do to actually get Stella and Alex to sit still in the same spot for a couple of photos with actual pumpkins. Porter hooked up with one of his pre-school friends and the two of them ran and ran to nowhere in particular. At one point we all looked up to realize that Porter had taken it upon himself to load up on the tractor that was headed back for the barn – while the rest of us roamed the far corners of the pumpkin patch. Let’s just say that I could – hypothetically – hold a gold medal should there ever be an Olympic sport requiring one to sprint across a dirt field carrying a large camera and two jackets without tripping over a single pumpkin or vine. Just sayin’.

Due to the fact that all of California was due to be clobbered with a massive storm, we decided to go ahead use the rest of the afternoon to get the apples off the trees before they all ended up on the ground as deer food. Thankfully when you put two doorknob-touching men on the task of picking apples you are guaranteed to end up with not a single apple left on a single tree within the entire property line. Anthony and Steve took their charge very seriously, and we now have 6 plentiful baskets of apples that we are going to cook, eat, pawn off on friends & family and use for obnoxious craft projects. Unfortunately, Steve says I can’t throw them at our snotty neighbors. Boo.

stella and alex
(click photo to see the entire set)

Warning: Heavy on the caps lock.

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So okay then. Here we are. Again. Us and all that awkward distance between posts. Lets just pretend it never happened, and deal with it in therapy later. See? Now isn’t that easier?

I made the mistake of showing that holiday slide show to the kids, and do you know how many times I had to watch that stupid thing? DO YOU? Like 15. Even when I tried escaping to another room, I could still hear the soundtrack. I may never be able to hear those three songs again. Like, ever. I have decided that I need a special vault wherein I can deposit all the music, books and videos that I have been subjected to endure on endless repeating loops. First would be Mama Mia (she ruined it for me forever), that dorky Tootle the Train book (the story doesn’t even make sense!), and let’s not forget the deliciously annoying Wonderpets Save the Effing Nutcracker. What is it about kids and their borderline inhuman ability to enjoy something just as much the 347th time as they did the first?

As payback we started throwing away all their toys. Ok, not really. But sort of. As we began the yearly holiday toy assimilation process it became increasingly clear that our inaction on ever doing a substantial toy purge was impeding our ability to reclaim our own living space. We did a roundup of clothes, toys and other miscellaneous unused items and donated to Porter’s school, the local thrift store, the local animal rescue shelter and I will shortly be shipping off a gargantuan stockpile of stuffed animals (we actually kept as many as we are giving away) to a contact in the Army Corps of Engineers deployed in Iraq who – with a couple of others – is distributing them to the children there.

It was unexpectedly easy to bring the kids on-board with our plan, considering that – for completely different reasons – this type of activity is not their strong suit. Stella’s inability to effectively process any and all feelings of nostalgia are always a source of contention between us. The conversation is usually one-sided and sounds a little like this: “But Mooommmmm! I love this broken plastic dog cup that I got at that fast food place when I was three years old and remember it was raining and remember we saw that rainbow and remember then we all laughed and hugged. Don’t you remember? How could you ever make me throw this away? I need to sleep with it every night.” This, the toy that has been buried in the bottom of a tote bin for the better part of the last two years.

On the other side of the conversation is Porter. He throws a fit because that is line item number one in his current job description. Porter is going through one of those stages right now where CONTRARY DOESN’T EVEN BEGIN TO DESCRIBE IT. I could offer him a bowl of ice cream and he would refuse it simply on principle. What principle? I HAVE NO IDEA. To further complicate matters, Steve is his unequivocal favorite. Why do I know that? BECAUSE HE TELLS ME. I am not even exaggerating. True story: we were standing in the kitchen last night and Porter comes strolling by Steve and I. As he passes us he nonchalantly tosses out an ‘I love you daddy’ and keeps on walking. I look at Steve, then at him and offer, “I love you Porter” His answer? “No. I like Daddy.” And this happens ALL THE TIME. He won’t let me read to him before bed, he won’t let me put him to bed, and in the middle of the night when he is screaming for someone to come get him because he hates his bed, who do you think ends up dragging in there to rescue him? ME, that’s who – only to be greeted with, “Nooo! I want Daddy!”

New Year’s resolution #1: Win back the love of my son. Use bribery if necessary.
New Year’s resolution #1.a: Devise plan to undermine husband’s appealing nature.
New Year’s resolution #2: Buy a vault.
New Year’s resolution #3: Get more massages.
New Year’s resolution #4: Master the Wii ski jump.
New Year’s resolution #5: Use the Caps Lock key less.

Pacifier

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Hey folks. And all your tapping fingernails. I’m getting there, I’m getting there. You’ll get your precious Christmas photos soon. In the meantime, to reward you for the enduring patience, I put together a little video slide show for y’all.

Enjoy.

(A word of warning, it is just a hair under 9 minutes long and it has audio.)


Happy Holidays 2008 from natalie on Vimeo.

The regular photos will be up on Flickr later this week.

Pirates, Princesses & Patience

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We are back from our 5-day birthday extravaganza, unpacked-ish, laundered-ish, and very sleep deprived. I am now facing a barren Christmas tree in my living room, Thanksgiving decorations scattered throughout the house, various memory cards to be emptied and uploaded, as well as a couple of blog posts to write (sorry Stel, your birthday letter comes late this year). Oh, and there are those pesky Christmas presents still to buy. Stay tuned. Hopefully by the weekend I’ll have performed some sort of mid-holiday miracle.

But for now, I must sleep.