christmas cheer.

OH MAN I LOVE CHRISTMAS.

Jazz brought all of our bins home from storage a few weeks ago and Isabelle was so, so excited to get everything out. I waited as long as I could and then I just couldn’t wait anymore. I mean, it was raining, we turned Elf on, and we got to work. Last year Isabelle was too little to “help” much, but this year she was totally into it. She unwrapped stuff and carried stuff around and put everything on one shelf of our bookshelf. She said, “wet’s go get anuh-zah bucket!” (Let’s go get another bucket. Has trouble with her “l'” and “th” sounds.)

We spent most of the day arranging and rearranging until she was satisfied with the ornament placement on the tree. She was careful to put the breakable ones up high “so winc doesn’t get dem” and the soft ornaments low “in case winc finds dem.”

Anytime anyone comes over, she takes them on a tour of all of her favorite decorations and points out the advent calendar. She seems to remember that each day = some sort of gift or treat so she is super excited about that. We were setting up all my little nativities and I gave her a little rundown of the story of Baby Jesus…afterwards she said, “But where’s Santa?” I almost just stuck a plastic Santa in as the fourth wiseman and called it good but her little mind warranted an explanation. “Umm, well, we celebrate baby Jesus by getting gifts for the people that we love? And also a pretend old bearded man brings us presents through our chimney! They go hand in hand, really.” So excited for the birds and the bees talk.

Also, Black Friday. Let me just say that we saw peeople camping out at Best Buy a week in advance to be the first ones in line. A WEEK. I’m sorry, but no sale is good enough for anyone to wait in the rain for a week. I wish that stores didn’t open at 8 pm on Thanksgiving. Target- have you no class? No standards? Do you really want people rushing to your store before the dinner plates are cleared?

I get that they have to be competitive, and I read somewhere that from Black Friday to Christmas, stores do 40% of their yearly sales. Almost half! I get it. But if NO ONE opened before 5 am on Friday, there would be no competition. Seems so silly to have hoards of people bleary and angry at midnight trying to shove their way through Sears for a portable DVD player. I ventured out at 7 AM Friday morning after a good nights rest and I was shocked that most of the stores were deserted. Everyone had come and gone. Sales were still going, so I got almost everything that was on my list. I love Black Friday and will continue to shop it but I REFUSE REFUSE REFUSE to do any of it on Thanksgiving.  Reeeediculous.