Bah Humbug!

"It's the most wonderful time of the year"... ugh.  Not so much.  It's the most stressful, harried, hurried time of the year.  And now, thanks to retailers everywhere... we get an extra month of anxiety to worry about it, since the decorations for Christmas come out while the Halloween candy is still on the shelves.  We've lost our minds over Christmas... it's not fun anymore!  It's all about finding the best presents for the best prices for the family members that we blew off on Thanksgiving to get those presents for those prices.  It's maddening.

I can remember as a little girl, being so swept up in the spirit of Christmas.  Being excited over the lights, the music & Santa showing up in the shopping mall. I would get myself so excited that I couldn't sleep.  I still can't sleep now, but for a completely different reason. 

 I feel bad for saying it, but if I'm really honest with myself, Christmas has become a chore. I have a 6 year old son, I shouldn't feel this way, but I just feel stretched so very thin - more than any other time of the year.  There are the work parties, the school parties, the gift exchanges, the dinners, the holiday concerts & parades.  Oh... and the decorating!  God help me the decorating!  

10 years ago, I bought a pre-lit tree, my first one.  All white lights.  The only time I have ever braved the crazies and actually camped out in the early morning hours on Black Friday, was for this pre-lit tree.  it lasted forever.  In fact it's probably still working.  However, last year, my son requested that we get a multicolored light tree.  So I gave the old one away, and purchased a multicolored tree.  This year, I dig the tree out, put it together... fluff it (which is a project of it's own), plug it in.. and of course, one whole section of the darned thing doesn't work.  I started to try and determine which light was the culprit, but it was such a lost cause, I went out and bought a string of lights... for my "pre-lit" tree.

I promised my son that I would get the Christmas lights up on the house this weekend, so last night I was up on the ladder in the dark putting the lights on the outside of the house.  Because even though he spends time in two different homes at the holidays, I don't want to feel like he's getting shorted on the holiday cheer.  But at the same time, I just don't feel the spirit anymore.  Everything feels like a "have to"...  And I wonder if he even feels the Christmas spirit, or if he just feels like this is the time of the year that Mommy is losing her mind and impatient.  I want to get back to feeling the excitement!  So I think I'll write Santa a letter... ask him to put the joy back into Christmas!