Amusing in hindsight

Making sure that the magic of Christmas - read SANTA IS REAL - is maintained can be a tricky prospect.

At about 5pm on Christmas eve Father and Husband started to assemble the brand new bicycle that was purchased on Amazon.com - wait, no, that Santa delivered - for darling Gryphon. They put it together, and found that a very important part was missing. THE SEAT.

Seriously, the seat was missing. Really? Is it actually possible for a bike to be delivered, in parts, without the seat? Apparently it is. THE MAGIC OF CHRISTMAS WILL BE RUINED!!!!

So, in utter freak out mode, Husband and I drove to the only place open at 5pm on Christmas eve in small town southwestern Virginia, WAL-MART, in the hopes of finding a replacement seat.

After much freaking out and humming and hawing, a whole other bike was bought, just to steal the seat. And all this was done in an incredible rush of course because the 24 hour Wal-Mart Supercenter was actually closing. Apparently they close on Christmas Eve at 6pm, not to open again until the day after Christmas when the store is overrun with scary rednecks looking for an after-Christmas deal. Who knew!

So we put a completely mismatched seat on the bike we had at home, and forced it to fit with a bit of creativity. (Did you know that bike seat posts are not universally sized? Annoying.)

But would the magic of Christmas be ruined for Gryphon? Would she know? Would she see the pink and purple seat on the blue and yellow bike and say "Santa has no sense of color! What's wrong with him? Maybe he's not real!" Oh, the horror!

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8am Christmas morning (yes, we managed to get the girls to sleep that late) - Down the stairs come two very excited girls. . . Fletcher runs straight to her extra cool new trike - YES!

Gryphon takes a cursory look at her brand new bike, with a mismatched seat, and goes straight to the rest of the presents under the tree. Cool bike, but hey, who cares?

Four year olds are completely unpredictable. And mommy needs a Zanex.

rebecca

from my sister:

Ho Ho Ho

Happy Christmas

From Fletcher and Rebecca 

Wonder tool, or The Tale of the BAD MOTHER

It was thirty degrees or so.  Father and Husband were looking under the hood of the car, trying to figure out how to change a headlight bulb.  Fletcher, almost two years old, a bit tired, running around the driveway, with pink-eye.  I was waiting to be able to drive the car so Fletcher and I could go to the pharmacy to get something for the pink-eye.  

So, Fletcher wanted in the car.  I thought that was a great idea.  Into the car seat she went.  Then she saw my keys.  She wanted my keys.  I gave her my keys.  Then I closed the car door.  

Click.

No way did that just happen.  Fletcher locked the car.  Shit.  

Shit shit shit.

She's got the only key.  Inside the car.  The locked car.  

We pled with her "Fletcher, push the button again!  Please, won't you push the button?  No the other button!  Please. . . " And then she dropped the keys on the car floor.  

Then promptly fell asleep.

In a small town, when you lock a child in the car (BAD MOTHER), the cops come.  Like six cops came, because they had nothing better to do, I guess.  First they tried those long flat pieces of metal that you shove in by the window to unlock the door (Slim Jim), but those didn't work.  Then they got this fancy new set of tools that includes a wedge, a thing that looks like a blood pressure cuff, and a long bendable metal pole.  But the cops, bless their darling redneck souls, didn't have a deft hand among them.  

Finally, about an hour after this all began, a locksmith came.  And Fletcher woke up.  He tried all the same tools, none of which worked, then pulled out one last tool.  Fletcher was crying now.  The Wonder Tool eventually worked wonders.  The cops finally left, and the locksmith wouldn't take our money, instead just wishing us a Merry Christmas.

Merry Christmas to you too.  

caffeine

The problem with staying at someone else's house is the coffee.  Making coffee in the morning is a process that is strangely very personal and is done in a state of half consciousness.  As a guest in someone's house, making coffee is a mind numbing struggle, and can be seriously annoying.  

Solution?  Don't be the first one up.