Man, if I continue to wake up at 4:15am, I might have to get myself a tot clock! I’m usually an early riser, but this is way too early, even for me. So I suppose I shall blog. In cop-out bullet point style. (Common’ now. It’s still dark on a Monday morning, what do you expect?)

  • I cannot believe that Christmas is this week! I’ll be heading to Richmond at the end of the week and am so excited to see all of our family and friends. I really think it’s my anticipation of all of this (and my mental list-making of all that must happen prior to our departure) that is contributing to my early waking.
  • One Christmas tradition I am carrying on with my kids is having them receive a new set of pajamas on Christmas Eve. As I kid, I remembered wearing cute, matching pajamas that made for extra festive pictures on Christmas morning. My kids will be rocking Disney princesses and aliens. Whatev. In fact, the alien pajamas are handmade. By moi. In the midst of an extra-busy Christmas season. Yes, big mistake, but Carson will be thrilled. He eyed this particular (hideous) alien fabric during a trip to Jo-Anns and pleaded with me to make him pajamas with it. I told him that he would have to wait for Christmas. I’m just crossing my fingers that my unbelievably detail-oriented child (Carson told me precisely how he wanted them to look) will be satisfied with his mother’s creation.
  • We went to the mall a few days ago to allow Carson to redeem a gift card he had to the Lego store. While he took for.ev.er. to choose his Lego set, I headed toward the Disney store with Mary Grace. As soon as she caught a view of the Disney store window display, the child literally leapt out of her stroller, landed smack on her face, hopped back up as if nothing had happened, and dashed off into the store. She then stood at the display of princesses and yelled in the most dramatic way possible (with equally dramatic hand motions), “PWINCESSSS!” That girl is too much. After Carson’s painstaking Lego decision, we headed onward. And passed Santa. Mary Grace made it abundantly clear that she wanted to see the jolly guy again, and we obliged as (a) the line was short and (b) this particular Santa looked a lot, um, jollier than the one at Meadow. Her visit (Carson was completely uninterested, so she went alone) was super cute and resulted in a very happy little two year old in cardboard reindeer ears. Thanks, Santa.
  • The kids’ school Christmas program is this evening. This is my first experience with such a thing, and I’m stoked. I’m also a bit nervous. I have visions of Carson standing up on stage with his hands down his pants (why do boys do that???) and Mary Grace, well, being nuts. Have I mentioned how much I love their school? I love, love it.
  • I also kinda love the Justin Bieber Christmas CD. Thanks to (the amazingly wonderful) Spotify, my kids were rocking out to Busta Rhymes and Mr. Bieber’s version of “Drummer Boy” last night. Matt was horrified that I had Justin Bieber blaring through our home, but I told him that pop music does Christmas music the best. Which is why I still count N Sync’s “Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays” and Mariah Carey’s “All I Want For Christmas is You” among my favorite Christmas tunes. And on that possibly incriminating note, I shall sign off…

Have a happy Monday-before-Christmas, people!!