Christmassy

Photo by Laura Legg

Ah, Christmas...  I am so enjoying thinking about Christmas and getting ready for it this year.  I think that having Christmas fall right at the same time as being ONE MILLION YEARS pregnant is making it much easier to be sanguine about being so very with child.  There are lots of other things to focus on and work on and use up my mental energy.

For instance, Christmas cards.  The picture you see above was my original plan for our Christmas card this year but due to me being not quite with it and a miscommunication with our photographer, I wasn't able to get the file for the photo until just yesterday.  For most of last week, I was going absolutely crazy because our Christmas cards weren't done.  I obsessed, I perseverated, I harassed our poor photographer's voicemail, I drove Robert ABSOLUTELY BONKERS with my never-ending, hormonally-fueled talk of the Christmas cards.  At the end of last week, I gave up my GRAND ARTISTIC VISION for our Christmas card and went with another option which allowed me to have them printed and put in the mail over the weekend.  It was such a relief to have them done and silence that shrieking, gut-level demand that I MUST GET THE CARDS SENT.  I haven't been crazy nesting pregnant lady, but apparently I was crazy Christmas-card pregnant lady.  Now that I do have the file, I probably could have gotten this version printed and sent to arrive before Christmas, but I didn't know when that was going to happen, if I was going into labor, etc. so the other version is on its way to its recipients.  I'm crazy these days, but not quite crazy enough to send a second Christmas card.  That would be funny, though; I wonder if anyone would just not notice that they got two from us?

Seeing Grace experience Christmas is another lovely distraction from being super pregnant.  She's really into the tree and her nativity scene and all that.  She is allowed to touch the tree and ornaments "gently" with "one finger", which usually seems to work.  Sometimes there is rather vigorous one-fingered poking of ornaments but so far nothing has broken.  At her little preschool, they are teaching her to sing "Away in the Manger" in preparation for their Christmas party later in the week.  I will admit that I don't really like that carol; why is it always the one that the children are assigned to sing in a church service or whatever?  When I was little, I distinctly remember preferring the jolly, joyful hymns like "Hark the Herald Angels Sing" and "Joy to the World" or the haunting minor key hymns like "What Child is This" and "O Come O Come Emmanuel"; even then, the saccharine stickiness of "Away in the Manger" did not appeal to me.  And really-- "little Lord Jesus, no crying he makes"?  MAJOR EYE ROLL.  To me, this has all the markings of someone who either a) has never been around babies or b) does not actually believe any of this happened.  However, Grace learning this carol and singing it off-key with the words mixed up has totally changed my mind and I am now here to tell you that this carol is COMPLETELY FANTASTIC.  Hearing her tunelessly warbling about the stars in the sky and "no bed for a crib" is heart-stoppingly sweet and hilarious and wonderful.  Having a child is generally wonderful, but I've got to admit that having a child at Christmas is TOTALLY AWESOME.  I'm so lucky to get to have another one of these creatures.