1. Embroider “Thomas” and “Joel” on the tops of their stockings. This is Tommy’s 4th Christmas and Joel’s 2nd without completed stockings. I have the stockings, I have the colorful thread, I have the needles, I have the skill. I am lacking the patience.
2. Find some patience deep inside a big slab of fudge.
3. Make a big slab of fudge.
4. Bake sugar cookies, frost them cutely and intricately, watch children gleefully bite the heads off the gingerbread man shaped cookies. Watch Tommy slurp the frosting entirely off a Christmas tree and throw the remaining cookie into the sink. Watch him admire his new green mustache, tongue, and teeth in the bathroom mirror.
5. Sit in the darkened living room with the Christmas tree ablaze in colored lights, while listening to the Ray Conniff Singers CD earnestly urging me to “Count Your Blessings (Instead of Sheep)”, and cradle a big slab of blessed fudge in my lap.
6. Make a batch of Zippy Eggs for Christmas morning.
7. Listen to hubby rustling around the tree downstairs in the late hours of Christmas Eve. Picture his big red toolbox at his side. Picture him putting together the new larger train table for the boy’s “Thomas the Tank Engine” collection. Picture him setting up an elaborate configuration of tracks, sheds, bridges, trees, loading docks, and the trains themselves. Think about taking a picture of the table fully set up because it will never look like that again. Go to sleep.
8. Wake up. It’s Christmas morning! Look at the Fisher Price nativity. Take a deep breath, remembering why all the work and preparations were necessary. Hum “Away in the Manger.” Smile.
Thank goodness for those big slabs of chocolate that are such a treat now but will demand some sweat and deprivation in the new year. Don’t forget the cookies for Santa (he’ll need a little strenght and patience puting that train table together). I would love to see and hear the excitement the morning is going to bring your household.