Christmas mishaps so far

1. My Christmas stuff didn't get brought down from the attic until Sunday night (the tail END of a four day weekend, the prime time-frame for doing much decorating)So then it was a MAD scramble Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday (between volunteering in kid classrooms, dance twice, gymnastics, more volunteering, field trips, and Girl Scouts) getting the tree set up, covered with lights and ornaments, all the other decorations out, and floors vacuumed in order to be ready to babysit Grace today.

2. Lights all worked when I tested them. Lights had STOPPED working after being strung on the tree. Went to string in a working strand over the top of the not working strand (it was just half the strand and I wasn't messing around with pulling the whole strand off again), and the non-working section started working again.

3. Lights stopped working again. I jiggled the bulbs until I found a sensitive one, then hung Em's Barbie ornament right next to it so I'd remember right where it is in case I need to jiggle it again.

4. Emily took down her ornament in order to more closely examine it. Lights went out again. Had to re-find the sensitive bulb.

5. Set out my gorgeous porcelain Santa collection (my mother has painted me one every year that I've been married) and realized I was missing one. Almost literally tore my house apart trying to find it. Dan found it still up in the attic, thankfully!

6. It's December 3rd and I have had zero time to even THINK about shopping, let alone actually DO any shopping. My next kid-free opportunity is next Tuesday, but it's only for two hours and won't leave time for most of what I need to do.

7. Do I even KNOW what I plan to buy for everyone yet??? (NO!!!!!!) I wonder if it's too late to do my shopping online instead this year?

8. Haven't had Christmas pictures of the kids done yet. No real idea of WHEN that's even going to be able to happen. Gotta throw in a visit with Santa this year, too, at some point. And we'll hope Connor doesn't loudly announce Santa as a fraud like he did a few weeks ago at the mall!

9. My kids have been in a real funk the last few days (very argumentative, sassing, blatant ignoring of my requests, etc) and I swear it's the full we just had moon. But even the threat of "Santa is watching you right now!" made ZERO difference. You know you're in trouble with the Santa threat doesn't do any good!! I was debating finding some jolly sounding man to call my children and play at being Santa and remind them to be good! I'm not ruling it out yet. *grin*

What more can I do but put a smile on my face and enjoy the ride! It wouldn't be the holiday season without chaos and disaster, right? Makes you that much more thankful when it all falls together and you get to spend a fabulous day surrounded by loved ones.