Santa's Rules

Every family does things a little differently; Christmas time is no exception!  Some families open all the "non-Santa" gifts on Christmas Eve and open Santa's gifts on Christmas Day.  Some families don't do Santa.  And in some families, Santa leaves the gifts unwrapped under the tree.  This makes me nuts.  I understand why people do it.  This Santa thing is a lot of stinkin' work.  And I can't imagine how my parents did it with three kids, but Santa wrapped every.single.item.  Well, maybe not bikes, but you get the picture.  Most of our Christmas traditions were adopted from my family.  

So here is how we do things at our house:

• Everyone (even Mom & Dad) gets new pajamas to open and wear on Christmas Eve.  It's something that my grandparents did for my mom and her sister, and it is nice to know that in pictures, no one has a hole in an inappropriate place or mismatched jammies.  (And no, these are not from Santa.)
• All other gifts are opened on Christmas Day, even non-Santa gifts.
• Every single present is wrapped.  Separately.  I know.  I'm crazy and I'm ok with it.  Two years ago, I wrapped an Elmo potty seat.  Unboxed.  Yep, I've got skills.
• Santa has different wrapping paper than Mom & Dad.  In my mind, this makes it all more believable.  Sometimes he has more than one type, but never the same as Mom & Dad's paper. 
• Santa doesn't do gift tags.  He ain't got time for that.  He just uses a fat black sharpie.  And no "from Santa" on the gifts either.  You just know it's from Santa because a) it wasn't under the tree yesterday and b) the special Santa paper.

What are your Christmas traditions?  Are you making new ones with your family, keeping some old ones, or a little of both?

Bring on the Joy

This year, I am welcoming Christmas (as early as retailers, neighbors, friends, and radio stations want to bring it) with open arms.

I understand why people get upset when Christmas music starts and wreaths are hung the day after Halloween, sometimes even earlier.  It already feels like we rush home from work, just in time to throw together a semi-nutritious meal, bathe our kids, and get ready for the next day... to do it all. over. again.  Why rush the holidays too?  I really do get it.  Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday too!  Could there really be a better day than to eat to our hearts' content with the people who mean the most to us without pretense of gifts and price tags?  To find happiness in what we have and what we've been through?  Certainly not.

I was one of those people who absolutely despised hearing or seeing anything Christmas-related before Thanksgiving was officially over, and even preferred it to wait until December came around.  But then, I had a child.  I found out I was pregnant less than two weeks before Thanksgiving in 2009.  I spent the holidays exhausted beyond comprehension, and more joyful than my wildest dreams.  I was amazed at what my body was finally doing, and I spent every waking moment planning and being grateful for that baby.  (You may think I'm exaggerating.  If you do, then you never knew me while I was pregnant.)  He's changed me in a thousand small ways, and a million big ones too.

One of the big ways is that I get to see the holidays through his excited eyes.  And Christmas?  That's just one giant joy-fest to him.  It's not even about the gifts to him.  He's too little to even understand that.  It's the lights, the people, the decorations, the parties, the parades, the Santas, the nativity under the tree!  Last year, "Santa" brought him one thing: an $83 PowerWheel.  Mommy & Daddy got him a pair of shoes (that he desperately needed).  The grandparents even managed to keep it toned down last year.  You know what he thought was the most fun part of Christmas last year?  Staying home all day, eating cinnamon rolls out of a can for breakfast, not changing out of our PJs, and watching Christmas movies.  All Christmas Day means to Dane is being allowed to stay home and play with Mommy & Daddy all day without interruption.

So you know what?  There will come a day when my son doesn't believe in the magic of Christmas.  He'll tell me he wants a gift card so he can "pick out his own clothes" when I ask him what he wants.  And he'll probably tire of hearing Christmas music on November 1.  But for now, he's amazed, and I'm along for the ride.  Let me rephrase:  I get the absolute joy of being along for the ride!  So, yeah, we'll probably put our tree up before Thanksgiving.  We'll probably listen to Christmas music during the Thanksgiving meal.  Does that make Thanksgiving any less special?  Nope.  And I for one hardly think Thanksgiving is offended.  I'm just squeezing every possible moment of joy out of each season.

PS - This does not mean that I have lost my mind enough to join in the Black Friday crowd that starts the evening of Thanksgiving!  :)

Allergic to Vacation

We just booked our family vacation!  I should be excited.... right?

I'll be honest: as much as we need a vacation, it makes me incredibly anxious to think about the actual trip.  Sure, I'd be crazy not to look forward to sleeping past 4:30am and soaking up some vitamin D while reading some trashy fiction.  But the truth is that Dane seems to be allergic to vacations and holidays.

It all started with our first family vacation in 2011.  Dane developed a 103.7 fever on our third night.  We rushed him to the ER where he promptly vomited all over me at the check-in window.  The doctor ordered a chest x-ray.  He asked again and again if Dane had asthma (because he was on all the breathing treatments and medications any kid with asthma would be) and we replied over and over "he's too young to be diagnosed with asthma; he has allergies."  He had just turned 10 months old the day before.  I wasn't ready for asthma.  I also wasn't ready for pneumonia.  On vacation.  But that's what he had, along with an ear infection and eye infection.  He promised us that Dane would be fine.  They pumped him full of antibiotics, oral steroids, and albuterol.  They sent us "home" with instructions to finish our vacation and come back if his fever returned or his breathing worsened.  They also gave us the name of a local pediatrician we could check in with in a couple days to make sure his lungs sounded alright.  The experience was a pleasant as could be for rushing to the ER with your 10-month old at midnight on vacation.

We tried to hang in there for a day, but being on vacation made things seem worse.  I guess it was like going on a Ben & Jerry's tour if you're lactose intolerant.  He was miserable, we were as exhausted as we had been when he was a newborn, and we were at the beach.  After a day of tears, I told Jonathan I wanted to go home.  We packed up our car and headed for our real home at 10pm.  It was a miserable trip home.  Dane couldn't breathe well in his car seat, Jonathan snored, and I almost hit two deer standing in the road.  I was heartbroken that the family vacation I had dreamed about for years had hit such a wall.  Even so, we were happy to be home.

Here's a few of the other reasons I tend to flip out a little over planning a vacation, or any celebration for that matter:

• November 2010 (Nana & Papa's first visit) - rotavirus
• Thanksgiving weekend 2011 - ear infection and asthma trouble that required oral steroids
• Christmas Day 2011 (2am)- ruptured ear drum/ear infection
• February 2012 (BFF Owen's first birthday party) - pink eye and ear infection
• Thanksgiving weekend 2012 - asthma trouble that required oral steroids
• Christmas 2012 - on antibiotics for ear infection
• Disney trip 2012 - the norovirus "Sydney" that's hit so much of the nation this winter

I'm a little skittish about vacations and holidays, as you can see.  Thankfully, this year, we are going into it knowing a few things that we didn't when we embarked on our first family vacation:

• Dane's does have asthma, so we come prepared.  That means nebulizer, nebulizer meds, and oral steroids.  A little breathing trouble no longer scares us as badly because we know what to do now.
• Our relationship with our beautiful, fantastic, intelligent, selfless pediatrician (can you tell we're smitten?) has grown to the point where we have her cell number for the really scary situations.
• We know that the hospital at our fave vacation location is top-notch and we wouldn't hesitate to make a visit if it was necessary.

Even so, do us a favor and send happy vibes and prayers our way in May!

"That" Mom

It's official.  I'm that annoying mom.  I probably have been for a while, but a recent online purchase that was delivered to the house today confirms it (for me at least).





I ordered a pediatric otoscope.  That's right, a device to look in my kid's ear when I think he might have an ear infection.  Let's face it, I dropped the ball bigtime last month and I don't want it to happen again.  One of the pediatricians in the practice suggested a handy little thing called a "middle ear monitor."  While I could certainly see the usefulness of something like this, it's big claim is that it can give you an idea of the likelihood of there being fluid in your child's ear.  Well, Dane practically always has fluid in his ear because he has allergies.  What I really need to know is if I need to take him to the doctor to get a round of antibiotics.  I certainly don't want to take him if he's not in need of antibiotics, because all parents know that even if your child doesn't need them, he probably will after a visit there!  Exposing an asthmatic little one to more plague than absolutely necessary isn't on the top of my list.  And because he never runs a fever, acts strangely, or has a change in appetite when he gets an ear infection, someone has got to look in those ears!

Enter the "pocket" otoscope.  (I find the term "pocket" hilarious because as crazy as I might be, I am not toting that around in my pocket all day.)  I've debated the purchase for quite some time, but the recent congestion in our household finally sealed the deal.  We'll see how it goes.  I figure for the cost of one co-pay to the pediatrician, it's worth a little peace of mind.  And most of you know I love disgusting medical stuff anyway so it's right up my alley.

Like Mother Like Son

I belch like a man.  I don't do it in public, but anyone who knows me has probably heard it and wished they hadn't.  My mom always says "I thought I raised a lady" every time she hears it and my dad says something along the lines of "righteous".  I'm proud and ashamed at the same time.  Maybe a better way to explain it is that I'm ashamed that I'm so proud of this ability.

I taught Dane to stick green beans in his nose one night at dinner.  Not exactly just for the heck of it, but it did get him to eat his veggies that night.

I recently told Dane to say "Daddy, suck it" and he willingly repeated it.  Jonathan's reaction was worth the fact that we had to send Mommy to time out to show Dane that wasn't appropriate language.

The point of all this is to tell you that Jonathan is terrified that no one is going to believe that when Dane does this crap at school, it was Mommy who taught him.  So I guess this is me letting you off the hook, baby.  It's out there in the world.  When he gets sent to the principal's office for teaching the other kids how to burp, they'll know it's my fault.

In related news, Dane called the cat a "turd" the other night.  I wonder where he heard that.