Cheerful Abundance

I feel like I have to preface this story with an observation. Bear with me.

You know how, when you socialize with a group of couples, that there are always different dynamics at play in their personal relationships that bleed out in social situations? Like, the super-lovey newlyweds who can’t keep their hands off each other at the dinner table, or the couple that finish each other’s sentences, always? And sometimes, there is that other couple, that couple that is just outright mean to and about each other throughout every conversation, but pretend that all that hostility and hatred is some form of kidding around with each other, and they explain it away as ‘that is just how we joke around’, but it isn’t ever funny, and whenever one of them opens their mouth, you kind of cringe and start looking away and pretending to have a lot of business involving your bread roll and the napkin on your lap, while the husband refers to his wife as a fat heifer, or the wife cracks jokes about her husband’s impotence? You know – those people.

Yeah. We aren’t those people, I swear. But we do have a select few insider jokes as a couple that, if they were said out loud in front of witnesses, would sound so terrible, and border on sounding like one of those couples. This story is one of them.

It all started with our Xmas cards after we had kids, and one of those stupid married-people fights we were having about the cards, and how we couldn’t get one decent picture of both kids to put on it, and how ridiculously large our Xmas card list was getting, and it sort of all came to a head when we had to give the printer some pithy little phrase to include inside of our cards, a phrase that can’t include the word ‘Christmas’ or read in a way that assumes the receiver’s religion has a winter holiday, or indeed, that the receiver has any kind of religion at all, because our list is a pretty diverse set of people. Good Heavens, those first Christmas cards are such serious business, aren’t they? I felt like we were disarming the cold war single-handedly, while solving global warming, making those cards.

So there we were, at least 2 weeks late on getting these damned cards printed, and the days were running into printing dates that meant that nobody in my family would even get the card before the holidays because they all live in other countries, and we were both blaming each other for everything wrong with these cards at that point, and incidentally, every other thing that ever went wrong with a project we had to do undertake jointly, and from there to everything wrong in the world today, and nobody was going to back down from this one, this epic Holiday Fight From Hell, when my husband brought up that we still hadn’t cut the list down to a manageable size, and he didn’t even recognize half the names on it, and we still did not have a phrase to print inside of them, and I snapped back that we should just be honest and have our cards printed to say, “Happy Christmas, Asshole”.

We did not do that, but it did disarm the battle, and to this day, it has become a code phrase between us, a shorthand to remind us to stay on the same team, and on odd holidays since then, one or the other of us will wish each other a “Happy Birthday, asshole”, or “Happy Valentine’s Day, asshole”. It is just such an awful, awful word to pair with anything celebratory that you cannot help but laugh.

So … my wedding anniversary and my husband’s birthday are the same day, thus insuring I forget both every year. But this year, I had a plan – a funny plan. Since we are super over-scheduled this month, and also have just undertaken a huge renovation on the new house (and therefore are super broke), this isn’t the year for the grand gesture, the big present, the wow moment, and I decided instead that it would be funny if I bought him a supermarket cake, and had them ice the phrase, “Happy Birthday, Asshole” on the top. But it turns out, not one bakery I contacted would do it. Apparently, even though I explained it was a silly inside joke, and he would love it, it is such an offensive idea that two bakeries said no outright, and one spent an extra ten minutes trying to anoint me with some old-fashioned Christian guilt about it.

I guess it’s cool with them that every cake I have ever gotten has had my name misspelled on it, but one swear word and everybody had to put down their frosting and get all judgmental and sanctimonious. Our anniversary and his birthday coincided with swim practice for the kids, so as we roasted in the hot chlorinated air of the pool’s viewing deck, I told my husband how bakery assistants all over town were firmly on Team Him, and nobody was willing to swear on his birthday cake, and he started laughing, and …

reader, I swear, this is how I know we are made to be married to each other …

he said, “I know. I couldn’t get them to write, ‘Happy Anniversary, Asshole’ on a cake for you, either.” And with that kind ofyuánfèn, what could I do, gentle reader, but swoon? We are just the 21st century Gift of the Magi, every day, around here.

So, I made my husband a mix cake from a box. And here is the worst part of the story – I don’t know what happened to it, but this was, hands’ down, the worst cake and frosting we have ever eaten, ever. Not just in the expected ‘from a box’ sort of way. the whole thing fell apart while being iced, slowly sliding in different directions, while the frosting from a can, rock hard at room temperature, ripped the top off of it and balled into little chunks of icing. Gamely, we tried to eat it, but … reader, I don’t say this lightly, but … it has to be thrown out. It is inedible. I never thought there was such a thing as bad cake, but there is, and I made one, and the best part of this whole story is, if I could have just gotten a cake that said, “Happy Birthday, Asshole” at least it would have tasted good.

I have two important writing deadlines tomorrow, and a roast in the oven that I don’t know how to cook, and I hate peeling potatoes and there are so many potatoes to peel, so obviously I am going to hide out in my office and blog, because that always makes problems magically disappear!

Easter is the first weekend of the kids’ spring break, because Parochial schools are good at stretching out holidays like nobody’s business, and so far, it has been busy, busy. Yesterday we had a basketball game, and the kids were so wiped they put themselves down for naps on the rec room couches afterward (no complaints here!). Once they were sufficiently rested, we coloured eggs with them, for the first time. So fun. I found the Tie Dye method on Hello Bee, and it turned out to be awesome.

Four year olds made these. Really!

I was kind of dreading dipping eggs into dye, because there isn’t a lot of room for error at our dining room table – one sweep of the elbow and dye would be everywhere, including curtains, furniture, and the dog – but this method has no dipping, and the kids were very careful. I wrapped the eggs in the vinegar cloth and held them all, and the kids took turns with the food dye. These are, hands down, the best eggs we have ever had, and food safe, unlike the ‘use a silk tie’ and ‘use Barbasol’ methods.The best is that, if there is a bit of the egg still white, you just rub the vinegar cloth, soaked with dye, all over it  before you remove it, and voilà (or WALLA! as many hilariously illiterate bloggers often say, to my wincing horror) – fully dyed egg.

So, we were crafty. And proud!

This morning, I woke up to little people poking me in the face to get up and see if the bunny came or not. He did. He did! And after my husband got me some caffeine, and I made the kids wait until I got dressed, we wandered out to see for ourselves. I am so mean – they were practically levitating off of my bed with excitement, and I made them wait, and wait, and wait.  There was a living room egg hunt, but they didn’t find all the eggs the bunny hid, and I can’t find them, either. I believe my better half might be of the mistaken notion that egg-hiding is a ninja-level event, or that our eggs were supposed to be in the witness protection program. There is an infertility joke in there somewhere, but I am too exhausted to make it.

Our bunny is a pretty entry level bunny, who worked the Easter aisle of Walmart pretty hard, so lessons learned for next year include: reading the packaging to make sure an item is ‘chocolate’ and not ‘chocolate flavoured’, and generally buying items that are cute but not packaged specifically for Easter, because that stuff is cheap, cheap junk. Which 4 year olds love, luckily, but you know, when you know better, you do better, and now we know.

Today is all about eating! I made a french toast casserole for breakfast that I think was so good that we were all speechless, eating it. Much better than the last time I tried to do this. When my blood sugar levels off again, I will post the recipe. And I made a bundt cake, my first. Isn’t this foolish – I have always, always wanted …. a bundt pan. Dream big, ladies! I do, and eventually it pays off! I will let you know tomorrow how it turned out, but it is the trashiest lemon bundt cake recipe, ever, so I have high hopes for it being delicious.

I better go peel potatoes now. Ugh. UGH! I can’t stand raw potatoes, yet love all cooked potatoes. So …. poor, poor me. How I SUFFER!

After what we are calling the Unfortunate Gingerbread Incident, I am more cognizant now of the minefield of classroom holidays, and thanks to Pinterest, I am completely paranoid about how high the bar can be set. And while I love the Bloggess’ ideas for classroom valentines (“Bee Mine”, attached to a bag of live bees, and giving every kid a kitten top my list of faves), that probably isn’t going to be practical. Where am I going to get that many bees, for starters?

Photo copyright Sweet Muffin Suite

How darling are these, for classroom valentines? The are a free printable, from Sweet Muffin Suite, and I can get glitter pencils from Oriental Trading. However, this is my problem: I love these, obviously. They are like Pinterest catnip to me. But is this the valentine that my girls want to give out, or the valentine I want the other moms to see my girls give out? I mean, I love the glitter pencil, and we always attach something to the valentines, but is it better to let the kids go to Target and pick out a character-themed valentine card pack, like Spongebob, or to make something like this at home?

The pro is, if I do this, my husband will help. We are trying to do these parenting things together, and it is kind of fun to dye easter eggs with him, to decorate for Xmas, to make valentines together. We get out the good bottle of Rye, put some music on, and get our craft on. And I appreciate it so much, that he doesn’t hang me out to dry, 100% responsible for being the one who plays the Stay At Home Mom role, who gets involved in this stuff. Also, he is an artist, so he can appreciate the fun of getting a little messy and drunk at the same time.

The con is, we have two girls, which means 50+ valentines. Do I have the patience to make 50 valentines? I am not sure. Am I overthinking this? OF COURSE I AM. That is what graduate school does to you – it makes you cautious of the dominant narratives, cognizant of the hegemonic reading of every object, and paranoid of your every motive. If you are looking for me, I will be over in the corner, weeping into my copy of Bourdieu and unpacking my giant backpack of white privilege.

Last year, my kids did not really understand the concept of ‘holidays’. At 3 and a half, they couldn’t put it all together – Santa, Christmas, presents, Boxing Day, New Years Eve. It just didn’t make any sense to them. They had fun, loved getting presents, and became big fans of gingerbread, but they had no way to connect the dots between any of the elements of the holiday.

So this year was a delightful surprise. They got it. They really got it! That Christmas is a specific day, that one can count down to it, who Santa is, that he brings presents, etc. So,so cute! But so much pressure now. They understand the concept of ‘holiday’, and now I feel compelled to make those holidays memorable, and to introduce them to the traditions that will fuel the holidays they spend one day with their own children. So much pressure, right? I don’t think I realized before how easy it is when your kids are little: screw it up, and they won’t remember. I think we did “Christmas Day” late one year for them, because they were sick. They didn’t notice. But now, it is all Santa, all the time around here.

So, New Year’s Eve. I let them stay up late (9PM!), watch movies, eat hors d’oeuvres, drink a little soda (a BIG deal!), and I foolishly though that they would just crash on the couches when they got tired, but no – they just got more and more wound up, and finally, my husband had to force bedtime on them, and there was much wailing and moaning. We made it to midnight, drank one fancy Absolut Mandarin cocktail each, ate banana splits, watched Thin Man, and then crashed. So uncool. We have tons of champagne in the fridge, courtesy of our realtor, who sent us a bottle of Veuve, then dropped off a bottle of Italian bubbles (and I swear I am not being all blogger-twee here: it really is called that), but it seemed to much to commit to drinking an entire bottle of wine. This is what happens when you chldren never learn to sleep through the night – you lose your drinking edge. A real tragedy, frankly.

Also, at this point, we are kind of feeling bad about all the presents our realtor has sent us. This house was not that expensive, you know? I worry that her whole commission is sitting in my fridge right now. It is guilt champagne!

I was excited this year to introduce the concept of New Year’s Day to the kids – bowl game watching, hanging out in one’s pajamas all day, football food, etc. They weren’t into it, despite the fact that my alma mater won its bowl game – one slept through most of the football, while the other begged to watch Sprout TV. But they met their first cheese ball, and their first summer sausage, and they got to see Mommy yell at the TV screen and the oven, so, a two-fer! I don’t what it is with me and crappy Pinterest recipes, but I got all excited about a french toast casserole that you don’t have to let set overnight, and as you can probably imagine, it tasted like soggy warm challah bread pieces. Not cute! I really need to step away from Pinterest recipes.

And now it is just boring all Wednesday. Thank God! I think I am over the holidays. I am at the point where I want regular, non-cookie breakfast food, a normal work day,real life. I love Christmas decorations, but I also love the moment they are all gone, and the house looks a little spare again. I think the tree is coming down tonight (famous last words, no doubt!), and with it, the End of Christmas. Everyone is napping right now, accidental naps, all of them. Its just me and the dog, and I think this is a good time to curl up in bed with my Nook and ready a trashy novel that, if asked, I will pretend is actually some serious work of literary fiction.

I have had the flu – the real, old-timey, why didn’t I get a flu shot, used to kill people style, capital-I Influenza. For the past 2 weeks, I was mostly confined to my bed, and there are whole days that are lost in a haze of drifting in and out of fever dreams.

Christmas wasn’t exactly the holiday I had planned, because of that flu,  but I am learning to shake off expectations, and just let it go. The kids were happy,and 30 years from now, they aren’t going to remember that we didn’t put up half the decorations, or make reindeer chow, but hopefully they will remember that there was a lot of laughing and I let them eat gingerbread cookies, for breakfast. It is tough, though – I have these glorious holiday ideas in my head; very specific visions of what makes the perfect Christmas. Ideas like, maybe I should start collecting Spode Christmas China, and then we can serve our Christmas dinner on this china, and it will become a lovely, cherished memory for the kids, this special holiday china, and 30 years from now, when my holiday table is expanded to include my childrens’ spouses and grandchildren, this china will be part of a set of treasured memories of every Christmas spent in my home. Clearly, marketing schemes work very well on me.

It is awfully cute. But then I catch myself thinking, well, it is a great idea, but where am I going to store it the other 364 days of the year? It isn’t like this house has a Butler’s Pantry, or a China Storage Room.  And how do you know where to stop, with Spode? I mean, they make everything in this pattern that you could possibly make out of china – hanging balls for the tree, salt and pepper shakers, large china Xmas trees that plug in and have blinking lights on them, cheese spreaders with china handles, highball glasses and dinner menu holders. I worry that once I start down this road, I will feel compelled to buy it all, and Spode is smart: they do limited edition patterns every year, special annual plates, and that kind of marketing really speaks to me. I also fear that, if I buy any of it, my friends and family will recognize it as my ‘thing’, that thing that I collect, and every present I ever get to the end of time will be something in the Spode Christmas pattern.

Clearly, it is a short path from a few pretty dinner plates to this monstrosity: the Spode Figural Deviled Egg Plate.

Internet, these are my first world problems.Should I buy Christmas China? This is what passes for a dilemma, in my fever haze. But I have this debate every year, when it goes on clearance after Christmas. Maybe this is the year. Maybe you are the horrible friend that is going to buy me that deviled egg plate. Hard to say.

The good news is, after a rocky start, both my kids had a great Xmas. They loved their presents, and I think we struck the right balance of stuff – not too much, and not too little, so that they were entertained and delighted, but didn’t end up with present fatigue. I drew upon my college sorority training in “Boot and Rally” to make it through the present opening phase of the day, and to make the odd appearance in the family room, but most of my day was spent in bed with the flu. Both girls visited often, curling up next to me and playing quietly, then patting me as I drifted off, hopping down to go find a more exciting playmate.

I made the gravy, but otherwise, my husband did the entire Christmas dinner, with little help. I must say, it was fun, in a fever-haze sort of way, to watch someone else sweat the timing of it all, and the frustration of cooking sides after the turkey comes out of the oven, when those sides are supposed to be cooked at different temperatures. I need someone to invent three great holiday side dishes that all cook for 30 minutes at the same temperature, and that cover the ‘potato’, ‘veg’ and ‘bread’ categories. He did a good job, and I hope he has more appreciation for how the stress of cooking a holiday meal isn’t the turkey, but coordinating everything around the turkey.

We did have one heartbreaking moment in the day, though. One of my girls has been kicking up a fuss at PreK for a few weeks. After a semester of great reports every day, her school behaviour has changed precipitously, something we have been attributing to the pressure being put on her regarding the School Christmas Pageant, and the importance of her knowing her lines, and the songs, and the dance routines, and … oh, for crap’s sake, the whole thing is ridiculous. These kids are 3-4 years old. But she felt as pressured as if it was a Broadway production, and finally, I asked her if she wanted to do it, she said no, and I said, okay. You don’t have to do it. You practice with your class, but you don’t have to do the show. And her behaviour starting picking up again, a little bit, but I am starting to suspect that, as a means of social control at the school, someone has been threatening her with Santa to make her behave.

And not only did it not work, but it left me with a little girl who wasn’t excited about Xmas, because, as we finally learned this morning, she didn’t think Santa was coming for her. Even when we got her to the family room, where she could see her stocking, stuffed with presents, and presents surrounding it, all from Santa, she wouldn’t go over to it, and insisted it was a mistake. With tears in her eyes, she insisted that those presents could not be for her. Finally, my husband walked over with her, sat her on his lap, got her to open a present or two, and she got a little more into the spirit, but when I asked her later if she had a good Christmas, she said she did, but then followed it up with, ‘But I was naughty’. And we talked, as we have in the past with them both, about how they are always  good girls, but sometimes they make poor choices, just like everyone else does, but someone at the school decided to trump that with their own message. We talk about how Santa knew what a good girl she was, and is, but missed the earlier message she got from a teacher, or a teacher’s aide.

I could just smack whoever decided to take the magic of Christmas away from my 4 year old as a means of controlling her behaviour. We never, ever suggest to our kids that Santa may or may not come for them – he is coming, and every year. Santa loves them. We never threaten or cajole them into good behaviour by holding the threat of Santa over their heads.  But for one of my girls, someone did, and she took it to heart, and given that this is the first Christmas that she has truly ‘gotten it’ – Santa, presents, cookies, the whole 9 yards of the holiday – it breaks my heart that some thoughtless adult decided to put that fear into her tender little heart, and take the joy of the season away from her.

Expectation (What I thought today would be like): wake up early, do a few finishing clean-up jobs, so as to have an immaculate house on Christmas morning, start a few sides for Christmas dinner, bake gingerbread with my girls, and decorate it with crazy sprinkles and coloured icing (for Santa), wrap the last few presents for my husband, go to the 4PM Christmas eve church service for a church we are checking out, sing a few carols and dance around the kitchen with my kids, tuck them into bed early, make a cocktail for my husband, put our feet up, and enjoy the season. Maybe watch a movie, eat some good cheese, or order in some dinner.

Reality (How it actually went): I have been sick for the last few days, and my time has been divided evenly between lying in bed, and lying on the bathroom floor, faced pressed against the cool tile. The house is  a mess, almost nothing is wrapped, and the idea of even thinking about food makes me have to go lie back down on the bathroom floor. Both girls started coughing last night, hard, which is how this started for me, and my husband is exhausted.

I need a Christmas miracle!

I can’t say I am the most involved parent in my kids’ classroom. I am not a room mom, and our school doesn’t have parent volunteers come in during the week to read or do crafts, but when we get requests for help for the holiday parties, we always say yes. For Hallowe’en, I sent in healthy snacks – little mandarin orange fruit cups with jack-o-lantern faces markered on them (Thank you, Pinterest!), and when I got the volunteer form for the classroom Xmas party, sent the form back saying I would make gingerbread.

This is what I do.

Gingerbread is my thing. Everyone has a talent or two in life, and mine is baking, and specifically, mine is gingerbread. It is good. That is a picture of a quick tray I made, above, and later this week, I will post the recipe and how-to, if you would like to make it yourself.  I do fancy icing, with lovely snowmen and reindeer, and tone-on-tone layers, and some of it I dip in chocolate, and it is heaven. People ask me to do it professionally all the time (no!), and once, I did a tray for a party and a guest stole half the cookies – just unloaded them into a ziploc in her purse – because “they were so pretty”. So, I have this talent, and I can only share it for about one month a year, and even though it is crazy labour-intensive, I am happy to do it for the school.

So, cut to last night, when the official ‘room mom’ called me. The school really wants healthy snacks for the party, she says. Like, maybe one sweet, but the other stuff should all be healthy. And then there is this deadly silence.Since I know this is her first year at the school, and since this is my second year in this classroom with this teacher, I tell her that, although yes,they do ask that, typically, the holiday party is a little over the top, and whoever does the food table at the kids’ party limits them a bit, and then all the rest goes to the Faculty Lounge as God intended, for the teachers to enjoy at their leisure after the kids leave for the day.

This is also met with a weird pause, and since I am a real grown-up, and I certainly am not going to pick this particular hill to die on, I fill the odd conversational void to say that I am happy to bring something else – whatever she thinks best. What do you need to round out the snacks, I ask? I am happy to provide whatever you want. Just tell me. And then it starts. Oh, no, she says. You can bring gingerbread. I was just calling to check. And I want to ask, check what, exactly? But I do not, because I (usually!) know the difference between the conversations you wish you could have, and the conversations you can actually have.

But now I am confused. If she isn’t asking me to change what I am bringing, and if I offered to change it in case she is too polite to just come right out and say it, then … what is the point of this phone call? I felt like maybe there was some sort of subtext that I was missing, some kind of secret mom code that I lost the manual for. If I said I was bringing gingerbread, and she agreed that was okay, then why call at all?

So, I am making gingerbread. And I might be in trouble for making it, but also, nobody is asking me not to, and when I volunteered not to, I was told it was okay to make it. My kids are in Preschool, so I don’t have years of PTA political experience to draw from. And I am not from the south, where everyone innately knows that every social interaction is steeped in unspoken social code. Can anyone translate what just happened to me, here?

I have this Christmas song on repeat on my iPhone. It gives me immense comfort, and I hope it does for you, as well.

Lyrics: There’s Still My Joy (Indigo Girls)

I took my tree down to the shore
The garland, and the silver star
To find my peace, and grieve no more
To heal this place inside my heart

On every branch I laid some bread
And hungry birds filled up the sky
They rang thy bells around my head
They sang my spirit back to life

One tiny child can change the world
One shining light can show the way
For all my tears, for what I’ve lost
There’s still my joy
There’s still my joy
For Christmas day

The snow comes down on empty sand
There’s tinsel moonlight on the waves
My soul was lost, but here I am
So this must be amazing grace

One tiny child can change the world
One shining light can show the way
Beyond my tears for what I’ve lost
There’s still my joy
There’s still my joy
For Christmas day
There’s still my joy for Christmas day

I could not eat another Buckeye, gingerbread cookie, or piece of candy cane if you paid me a million dollars. I adore the holidays, as only an atheist can, but there is this line where, suddenly, I need them to be over. I love seeing my house decorated for Xmas, but I also love the day we can take the decor down and pack it away. Everything looks a little cleaner that day, a little less cluttered, a little more spare.

Getting the holidays out of the way means I can get back to my true calling in life: stalking a very particular Michael Kors handbag on eBay. It was a limited edition bag last Christmas, and it turns out, was the most perfect bag in the history of handbags. big enough to carry a laptop and files without being ‘briefcase-y’, and perfect for carrying a folding potty seat and extra pairs of pants, without looking like a mom bag. I couldn’t justify the cost, the first time I saw it. Then, when I could justify it, the bag was nowhere to be found. The last sighting was on Zappos. But I decided to sleep on it, and in the morning, it was sold.

On eBay, similar bags show up. Quilted, but patent. Black, but not quilted. Gunmetal grey, not black, but quilted. A truly horrible denim version. A black, quilted version, but handbag sized. eBay is my Pequod, and I spend many sleepless nights on her, running random search terms. Maybe someone is listing it, but doesn’t know what it is called? Maybe the listing doesn’t mention that it is quilted? What search terms will bring it my way?

Mis-spellings on eBay are my secret weapon. My girls wear a lot of NWT “Hannah Anderson” stuff, bought at way lower auction prices than “Hanna Andersson” would be. But everyone knows how to spell “Kors”, it seems, and the bag is elusive. Also, I might be more than a little obsessed about this. But it is so pretty in person. And I have never seen anyone carrying it, which is a criteria for me. Save me from the ubiquitous Coach bag! Or the fake Chanel totes, which are all over the place here.

This entry has no ending. I lust after a handbag I can’t have. Poor me. Poor first-world problems me!