I’m so busy. I’m so busy. Are you SO BUSY?? It feels like one thing after another, and never done. But I know we are near the point where suddenly Everything Will Be Done. Ideally without any of us having murdered the spouse relaxing in the next room.
There are holiday things I like to do (festive baking, and distribution of same; holiday festivities with friends; doing a Christmas puzzle; leisurely Christmas shopping in stores; reading Christmas books by the Christmas tree; tipsily watching the movie A Bad Moms Christmas; writing gift-idea posts; thinking in a more leisurely way about presents; contemplating/implementing a wider spreading of festive feelings/treats/donations to people/businesses outside our own household; going to holiday fairs / special Christmas-light displays / holiday performances) that didn’t get done this year because I was busy doing Everything That Literally Had To Be Done; I wonder if next year there are some adjustments that could be made so that people who are 99% enjoying the holiday, and doing every blessed thing they want to do, while jovially complaining about the ONE PERSON they have to shop/wrap for and the ONE SINGLE THING they do to contribute, could be better balanced with those of us 10% enjoying the holiday and doing 99% of the work and missing out on many of the things we want to do.
i am not saying that i’m *enjoying* the holiday, but i am saying that my spouse is doing about 70% of the work this year and i do *not* hate it.
I wrote out the grocery list but then I felt faint :)
Husband went. It took him 4 hours with the lines.
I feel much better.
It’s Christmas Eve here in Singapore and my husband left by himself to go shop for a handful of gifts, like every year.
We are hosting some Navy members who are deployed to our city for Christmas dinner tomorrow, and yes, I’m having it catered, but also today I am cleaning and helping a middle schooler bake desserts, and prepping for tonight’s dinner, and making sausage to go in a breakfast casserole said spouse casually mentioned would be good for tomorrow but they don’t sell breakfast sausage here so I shopped and planned and prepped and cleaned.
Also, I went back to work for the first time since I had my oldest (almost 16 years!) on December 16. Poor planning? Yes. But now we are both working full time and I’m still finding time to host three men I don’t know on top of all the other Christmas magic I created.
My micro aggression was signing all the tags “to kid from mom” and leaving dad off of 90% of them.
Those gift tags improved my holiday mood significantly.
(My spouse just asked where to find something on the counter of the kitchenette of our hotel. We’re talking a 3′ run of countertop.)
Me (text to BIL): We had several boxes delivered to FIL’s house today. We’ll wrap them when we get there.
BIL (text): If one of them is a rice maker, it has already been used!
Me (in person at FIL’s house): oh, you weren’t joking. wait, would you guys use a rice cooker? I got that one for (hubby).
BIL: oh, yeah, we’d use one. We’re going to make XYZ in it for Christmas.
***
My plan — My SIL takes over FIL’s kitchen at holidays, so I sent a rice cooker my hubby wanted for Xmas (and a 5 lb bag of rice!) to FIL’s house so I could make rice balls for my kids without getting in the way. A planned upgrade to our rice cooker. My reality — we bought my BIL & SIL a $200 appliance and they are making something my kids won’t eat.
Me (in the car to the AirBnB): “um, so your brother thinks that all presents delivered to someone else’s house, a house where multiple families are gathering this year, are for them?”
Hubby: (laughing) Clearly.
I love these crazy people and this is absurd. I hope my other BIL/SIL don’t notice they got less expensive gifts this year.
Did they use the rice too?
Are they opening everything to pick and choose what was ‘clearly’ bought for them and only them?
Oopsie, we used it, it’s ours now!
Madness.
That is FULL ON BONKERS. I could see, if it had been something where they had requested a very specific item and you had also told them you were giving it to them, making that assumption, but otherwise? At SOMEONE ELSE’S HOUSE???
Every once in a while, I become more grateful for my in-laws. This is one of those times.
Wait, are you not cheerfully repossessing the rice cooker at the end of the holiday?
Thanks for the internet validation that this was insane. My husband was being so nonplussed, I needed feedback. The next day SIL addressed it directly/ apologized and BIL cracked an awkward joke. We left w/the rice cooker and the 1/2 bag of remaining rice. I ordered one to be delivered to SIL/BIL because it clearly brought them joy. A non issue long term and decent after-the-fact communication.
Well, this year was a mixed bag. I got some volunteer work in, but it took longer than I thought and cost me a window to write cards. I’ll do some on the weekend and whatever I can mail by NYEve is what I can do. I shop very early, so gifts and wrapping have been done for a while. It’s the baking that really got me. I only baked one thing ahead for the freezer, and every day this week has had me fitting some kind of cookie into the day. I did as much as you could of making doughs up at once and chilling to bake another day. I tried one new thing, but I think I’m going to quit baking another. I bake a lot of favorites to share. I didn’t get to spritz cookies yet, but I will tomorrow night and they just won’t get shared as widely. I’m trying not to let the perfect be the enemy of the good. I’ve had several social opportunities these last 2 weeks on top of all of this. I regret nothing. My community and I need each other even more right now. Best of all, there was a new twig on the family tree this summer, so I will get to visit and cuddle a smooshy 5 month old baby, which is good stuff indeed. 🎄
Well, my husband was away for a work conference from Dec 11-15, and then he came home with norovirus, so I stuffed him in the guest room and wouldn’t let him emerge until he felt better, which turned out to be Dec 20. So I had been solo parent with the 4-year-old and the 8-week-old who still wakes up 2-4 times a night. We were already planning to have a very low-key Christmas, but in the midst of all that, he and I also decided to skip Christmas presents for each other since neither of us had bought any yet.
That seemed like a practical and reasonable idea at the time, but now that I have wrapped the mountain of gifts for the 4-year-old (it’s the first year she’s really really excited for Christmas) and the token gifts for the baby (he gets scared of his own sneezes; he doesn’t need presents), I’m realizing Christmas morning is just going to be our daughter opening gift after gift, and that’s not a great message to send her about sharing and patience and etc.
Anyway, I did manage to do two Christmassy things that are important to me: a Christmas concert with a friend, and I baked some cookies yesterday (only three kinds when I usually make eight or nine kinds). OH, and I managed to get a decent picture of the kids in front of the Christmas tree and order cards, which I mailed yesterday. So I’m just going to try to ignore that the house is a mess and everyone’s clothes are clean but in wrinkled piles in the laundry basket, and enjoy this first Christmas with two kids. And maybe next year we’lll get it together and we can ALL have presents for Christmas.
I hope you were able to relax and enjoy it. She’s 4. She won’t even remember this Christmas in any detail in 4 years. You aren’t damaging her for life.
I say let Christmas 2025 be the Christmas of Swistle! Make the adjustments, do what YOU want and let the rest goooo.
Things are going well at our house, though my husband was sick over the weekend and I’ve just barely awoken to the fact that he will not have to travel for work over Christmas. We couldn’t know until Sunday, so it was hard to get excited. But it’s Christmas Eve, which my ten year old said is almost better than Christmas, and she’s right. The anticipation is so much of the fun.
I’m sorry. I’m sure it’s made even worse by the fact that you usually enjoy the after-Christmas rest and quiet and you have to work on the 26th.
For reasons that aren’t mine to share, I hosted 4 extra people for 3 days. Doubling the number of people in the house and necessitating the use of air mattresses. We then had another 5 for Christmas dinner on the tail end of that run. Every bit of counter space is full of drying dishes and the dishwasher is running. My husband dealt with trash, compost and large furniture moving. My mother helped put away food and wash dishes for the first hour. The three small children were sent to bed, and the teenager who lives here agreed to wrangle the youngest while I cleaned. The parent of the visitors (who will be sleeping here tonight) left on a two to three hours errand I didn’t know about until Christmas day and everyone else just left for home. There were reasons I sort of understand, but also… No. There were things I loved about this 3 day Christmas, but this will not become tradition.