I can't say that I have been enjoying Christmas over the last few year. I do not think of myself as a bah hum-bugger but I have lost the joy. It is now so much more work, and I never get to enjoy it. I
spend the entire time pleasing others. By the time the last kid goes to bed on Christmas night I am totally void of good will, happiness and when I lose my humor I feel like I can close the book. My humor keeps me going and helps me through a lot. But it does me no good at Christmas, the Christmas season that now last for two months is exhausting. I lose my humor and then I just want to go to the bed and cover my head till the new year.
This year I had it figured out we would skip Christmas and go on a vacation to Disney. The relatives can spend their holidays were ever they want, I won't be here. The kids do not need any thing and they have become so materialistic that I want to scream. No more stuff........ Lets go make some memories that will last a life. The CA vacation got cancelled because of my job. The summer camping trip one of the girl could not go because her college started early. So Christmas we are all together and have time. Then last week my daughter tells me she can not go because her boss at the coffee hut in the mall will not let her off during the holidays. Seem she sells more coffee then, than any other time of the year. Who new people drank more coffee then. Now I am disappointed but still thinking, how not fun it will be with out her. When I gained my presents of mind and thought, what am I thinking I can not leave a kid home with out a tree and family while we're hanging with Micky. I wanted to tell her to quit because minimum wage jobs can't be that hard to find. but on the other hand what kind of message am I sending her that she can just quit because she want to have fun. So I slowly let the other kids know that we may not be going to Disney. Now I am back to, how the hell am I going to pull a Christmas out of my ass. So I do nothing hoping that I will get a sign from some where telling me what to do.
Last week we were going to get our annual holiday photo done, the high light of my holidays. I thought why are the vet techs doing this so late how will I get Christmas card done and mailed in time. I stayed up all night making new holiday jammies for the dogs 8 pair and we get up early and get to the College and drag all the kids and dogs in to do the photo and I am told to get a handout and pick the package I like. What do you mean? Don't we get a CD with the photo shoot on it so we can pick the pictures we like. NO. We went with a professional photographer this year and you can just pick the package you want. I said "where are the Christmas cards?" We are not offering them this year. What, no Christmas cards. I really had to bite my lip so I would not start my mouth running and say things I would regret, Okay then what is the biggest picture I can buy, because this will be the center wall picture of the house and it needs to be over 20 inches. I was told they had 8x10s. Now I am so mad I want to cry this is a big family event that all my friends from around the world look forward to. Damn Dog house Christmas cards. The photographer comes down and tells me he can work with me on this and just pick a package for now and call him in a day or two and he will work out some kind of Christmas card for me. OK lets do it I don't have much choice. They took about 7 shots and tell us to pick one, and turned the little black box around so we could see the shots. In my mind I am livid as the screen to pick from is the size of a cell phone. The best I could do with that was pick the one that looked like we were all facing front. I have no idea if the eyes are closed and the mouths open but we are looking at the camera. And you can come back and pick up the pics on the twelveth. I left with such disapointment I just went home and went to bed. When I got up later that night I talked to a friend or should I say cried to a friend. She told me to get my oldest daught to come home on the next weekend and we would take pictures and get them going on our own and not wait to find out that the ones we had are bad.
We got things going the next weekend. I went out and got a Norfolk pine in a pot and hung some bulbs on it put a sheet on the wall and hung stuff on it. Now I have no idea how we did it but we did manage to get pics. The dogs were not cooperating the kids were fussing and fighting and I was having power surges from hell. I finally yelled everyone smile I will not look at this pic for the next 20 years with grouchy faces.
We did get some pics and I sent in my order and the Christmas Cards came before the photos I took with the Professional. Now all I have to do is figure out what I am doing for Christmas. I hate to shop and have not given it one thought of what to buy. We still have a little tree and some lights on the front of the house but I sure do not feel the spirit of Chrismas and wish I could get some kind of sprit going for the sake of the kids. I will send out the cards and hopefully find my happy place before Christmas gets here.
Hope Christmas was good, we weren't really feeling it this year either. We didn't even wrap our gifts for each other, just for the kids (nieces and nephew). I know what you mean about the pictures! I've been doing New Year's cards for a few years as it's hard to find time to get them done in time for Christmas with work, school and animals.
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