Dear Santa

Dear Santa,

It's been many years since I've written a Christmas wish list, but I feel the need for some magical intervention for some of these requests. Everyone knows you're magic, and can therefore maybe help me out with a few things I would really like this year that might not be available at my local Sears. Namely:

1) The ability to sleep past seven in the morning. Because there is nothing more irritating than A. taking Cubby away on a Sunday morning so that Mommy doesn't have to stumble out of bed and wrestle clothes on the little maniac at six a.m. only for Mommy to lie there wishing she could just enjoy this one morning off and GO BACK TO SLEEP FOR THE LOVE OF GOD. So, a little help here would be nice.

2) Proper circulation in my hands and feet. You can blame my mother for this. The woman is famous for wearing long johns in Tucson, Arizona and having hands and feet so cold they would stun a corpse. I'm not as bad as she is, but my hands, feet, and nose pretty much stay cold from November until May. This is a serious liability at Blackrock. So amp up that blood supply to my extremities, okay, Santa? Awesome.

3) A dishwasher. This would also be on the MiL's list, I suspect, since she actually does most of the dishes in our house. But when she isn't here, I do them. And DAMN, I am SICK of doing all our dishes by hand. We make SO MANY DISHES in a day, what with A., Cubby, and I all eating three meals a day at home, most of those actual cooked meals. I realize that a dishwasher is an item most people can procure without magical intervention, but most people don't live in 160-year-old house with an electrical system dating to the 1920s (people just didn't use much electricity then, and thus didn't have the amount of current available to them that a modern house might have) and barely enough hot water in the winter to keep the occupants of the house bathed and presentable.

So first we need more electrical capacity, then we need more hot water--so you'd better add a new hot water heater to this list--and then we need a complete reconfiguration of our kitchen to make a spot where a dishwasher might actually fit without blocking one of the three doors that lead in and out of that room.

Maybe I should have made that last one into a few separate requests, but I'm sure you follow.

4) A guaranteed nap for Cubby during the day. Nap times have gotten pretty sketchy lately, and there has been more than one day recently in which I have gotten all of zero naps out of him. He's too young to stop napping. Or rather, his mother is too old and tired for him to stop napping. I need a break sometime between six a.m. and seven p.m. Morning, afternoon, I don't care, as long as I get an hour in there sometime when I can go to the bathroom without a toddler in attendance whose greatest joys in life are turning on the faucet and turning off the lights. Peeing in the dark with the water running is not my idea of a fun time.

5) An immediate cease and desist order for all the damn spiders in my house that are spinning webs with such abandon that the very day I manage to sweep them all away, I find a new one in progress. Although, I suppose I should be grateful none of our spiders seem able to spell as well as Charlotte. I don't think they'd have anything very nice to write out for me.

6) And while I'm at it, peace on earth and goodwill toward men; women; children; and all cute, furry creatures great and small.

Thank you in advance for your assistance,

Kristin

The Stubborn Survivors

Last night as I was finishing up the dishes, I noticed the tomatoes sitting on the mantle in the kitchen.

That's right. Tomatoes. From the garden. Two tiny Roma tomatoes that have been sitting in the kitchen since the end of September. I sort of forgot about them. One of them is kind of wrinkly, but they show no signs of rot or anything.

I don't know what I'm supposed to do with two tiny tomatoes. It's not as if I can make salsa with them or anything. Maybe I'll just let them sit there until I can once again say that I have tomatoes at Christmas.

And then I'll eat them, because really, I just want to get them off the mantle in the kitchen already.

Stylin'

Remember the winter boots I introduced to you a few years ago because I know the whole world cares about my footwear? Well, they have another fan.

We're still working on the concepts of "left shoe" and "right shoe."

Cubby never fails to make me laugh on a daily basis. He also never fails to make me consider the merits of military schools on a daily basis, but that's life with an almost-two-year-old, I suppose.

Small Things

Yesterday Cubby and I attended a birthday party for a now-three-year-old second cousin, at which there were many small children in attendance and pizza for lunch. The pizza place, knowing the pizza was for small kids, double-sliced the pizzas. That is, they cut each regular piece one more time so there were lots of narrow slices. And all the parents were sitting around looking at our little people with their little hands easily maneuvering their little slices of pizza to their little mouths and saying to each other, "These narrow slices are brilliant. How come I never thought of this?"

Because we are not so brilliant, I suppose. Sure does reduce the amount of tomato sauce to be cleaned off of faces and clothes, I'll tell you that.

Bravo, Papa John's. We salute you and your double-slicing.

Throw Those Expectations Out the Window

I think that's excellent general advice for parenting, although of course I have a specific event in mind. That is, our trip to get our Christmas tree yesterday with Cubby.

As I have mentioned before, we go to what is basically a hardscrabble farm in the hills with some trees planted around the house to get our tree--15 dollars to cut your own, 20 for a pre-cut one. The past couple of years we've just grabbed one of the pre-cut trees they lean against the picnic table in the front, extra five bucks be damned.

Big spenders, that's us.

This year, however, since Cubby was with us we decided to wander around so he could run around and play some. And then we thought, since he's such a fan of tools and since we found a nice tree still in the ground, A. would cut our tree so Cubby could watch him use the saw.

Fun for all!

Except.

First of all, the people that own the place have acquired chickens (chuk-uhs, to Cubby). And no boring old tree is going to compete with chuk-uhs. Especially since these little hens were quite obviously accustomed to getting food from people and ran right up to us when we got out of the car. And followed us part of the way to the trees.

They did not, however, follow us all the way, and when we tried to bring Cubby to the trees after a play session with the chickens, he was not so pleased with the re-direct. He was also not very pleased about the fact that he wasn't allowed to hold the saw that A. was using to cut the tree.

He was momentarily appeased by the massive truck with some kind of hydraulic hoist on it or something that was sitting outside the barn, but then, once again, not too happy about being removed from it to get back in our car.

Sorry, kid. We don't live here, and I don't think the nice man who is trying to work on this truck really wants us to hang out all day.

So, all in all, it was maybe not the making-Norman-Rockwell-memories experience it might have been, but we got our tree. Mission accomplished.

A Trip to Hallmark

Today is my newest niece's birthday--this would be my sister's fiance's daughter, so technically a step-niece, but let's just dispense with all that "step" nonsense, shall we? So, Newest Niece, hereinafter referred to as N.N. because it's shorter, is turning 1o today. The significance of this event to you will be explained later, but first! A short story about a birthday card.

I don't usually send birthday cards, but I made an exception for N.N. Cubby and I were in the Small City on Tuesday, specifically to go to the mall.

I sort of feel as if I should enclose "the mall" in quotes (like, uh, that), to convey to you how unlike this particular mall is to the sort of malls you're probably thinking of. I think it has two dozen stores. A Small Mall for a Small City.

ANYWAY.

I had some birthday and Christmas presents to buy, so off we went. And while we were there, we stopped in at the Hallmark store for a card for N.N.

I should explain some logistics of moving around with Cubby. Despite his earlier love of his stroller, he does not love it now and will not be contained. So I have the choice of either carrying him, which is somewhat detrimental to my back after a short while, or putting him down. This usually results in him eventually making a beeline for something inappropriate, being pulled back, getting mad, and then I have to pick him up again anyway. It's a challenge.

By the time we got to the Hallmark store, my back was due for a break, so I put him down.

Bad plan.

You know what Hallmark stores look like, right? All those cards! So many pictures! RIGHT AT TODDLER LEVEL.

Cubby stood there for a second while I surveyed the MASSIVE rack of cards (From the Group, For a Preteen Boy, You're Old and Here's a Rude and Not-Very-Funny Card) (that last ones's not a real category, but I think you know what I'm talking about) trying to see where to even start. And then he was off. He pulled out a card. So I said, quite reasonably, "Okay, you can look at that one. But just that one, okay?"

Sure, Mom.

Five seconds later, he had a stack of cards in one hand and was racing down the aisle straight towards the lady at the end who was giving me a look that clearly questioned my ability to control my child.

No, lady. I can't control him. Bet you couldn't either.

Anyway, I chased after him, and when I caught him, took away the cards. Then I looked at them. He had a few of all the same card, and lo and behold, they were specifically birthday cards for a niece. Well then! Our work here is done! Thank you for picking out N.N.'s card, Cubby, and let's get right out of this store before you find the highly breakable seasonal ornaments!

That's how shopping with toddlers goes.

Okay! Now here's where you come in. Now that I've made N.N. famous (HAHA) online, it's time for all you people out there to join me in wishing her a happy birthday in the comments. So everyone who left comments yesterday discussing ironing*? Stick a happy birthday for N.N. in that comment box, would you? And everyone else, too. GO!

* Thank you, by the way, for the numerous comments on what is essentially the dullest topic ever. It's nice to have company in my lameness.

A Sign that I'm Boring?

Yes, for today, we shall discuss ironing.

I KNOW. The excitement! But you know, that's just the way my life goes. Sometimes I find myself ironing at 8 p.m. because Cubby is being, ahem, difficult, about napping, and I am therefore finding it difficult to get anything accomplished during the day. At least, anything that really must be done Cubby-free. Maneuvering a searingly hot, heavy piece of metal on a cord, with a plug, most definitely qualifies.

So. Ironing at 8 p.m. My original intention was just to iron A.'s shirt for him, because it's his only clean one and it's been sitting around for days unironed and he had to go to court this morning and so needed a shirt. So even though pretty much the last thing I wanted to do at that stage in the evening was iron, I did it.

I really hate ironing shirts. Men's shirts particularly. They're just so big, and they have so many parts, and I can never get the crease in the arm right. But I figure it's mostly under his suit coat anyway, right?

Right. Any justification for my ineptitude is aces.

Then, since I had the iron out, I decided to iron the pile of napkins and tablecloths that's been sitting around for, um, months. Yes, literally.

This being Blackrock, the House of Accumulation, we have way more table linens than any modern family needs. But of course, many of them are from the Not Modern era (several sets belonged to A.'s great-great aunt, which would make them . . . at least a hundred years old). So we use them. And when they are used, they do not get returned to the sideboard until they've been washed and ironed. Which is why there is usually a pile of napkins somewhere downstairs sitting around awaiting ironing.

I was pretty sick of looking at this particular pile of two tablecloths and about a dozen napkins, so I ironed them too. Ironing tablecloths kind of sucks, because they have to be moved around so much on the ironing board, but ironing napkins I find to be sort of soothing. I mean, I'm not saying it's something I go out of my way to engage in to calm my nerves or anything, but it is delightfully simple. One flat square ironed all smooth, then folded into the desired shape and pressed once again, and what was once a ball of wrinkled linen is now a respectable and classy napkin ready for company.

That's kind of nice.

So how about you, poppets? What's your opinion of ironing?