Christmas Eve Eve!

Hola Wild Boy friends and followers, and a VERY Merry Christmas Eve Eve to all of you from La Casa de Testosterone. Most of you realize that here in La Casa we fully embrace the magic of the holiday season. Even the Wild Boys usually make a concerted effort to (kind of) behave in attempt to appease the parentals and Santa himself. Santa, however, seems to see right through their sweet little smiles. He's a tough one, this guy. Or, someone may have farted on him immediately before this picture. Really hard to tell, but knowing my kids and the amount of giggling happening coinciding with his scowl, I know what is most likely...

 

But I digress. Super huge apologies to anyone that may have noticed the enormous gap between blogs. I can explain (seriously, that has become my life mantra as of late). See, we're busy. No, like really busy. And then Gavin made the school basketball team, and somehow sixth graders get the short end of the stick on that, so they have the latest practice slot. Up until two weeks ago we were practicing four nights a week until 8 pm. That's the last practice after the seventh and eighth grade boys, and by the time we get into the gym the smell of body odor hits you like a physical fist to the face. The combination of late hours, hard practices, and brain cell death from BO and AXE makes the boys super loopy, too. Practice has been known to devolve into some wild disarray, for sure.

 

 

But it's paying off. They're becoming a pretty finely tuned foul generating machine. That's a goal, right?

 

So now we have two nights a week that are games, and we get home before 8:45. It's pretty exciting, for sure. Aaaaaand now we are on school break, so there's no homework. Can I get a cyber high five from EVERY parent out there who was pretty sure they might actually die if ONE MORE assignment came home before the break? I developed an actual eye twitch, and when Gabe mentioned field trips and Tuesday envelopes I had to actually have a drink and do some meditation before venturing in to see what surprises may await us with zero seconds to spare. Within the past two weeks I have stumbled into my job on more than one occasion with wet hair, no shoes on, and clutching a pack of pop tarts because the mornings (and the commute) involved rounding up backpacks, books, sweatshirts, sports gear and scout gear. Then returning for the kids I forgot in the process, and then studying spelling words and the rise of the Sumerian civilization while navigating morning traffic (yes, it's just deer and turkeys, but they're hell to avoid) and drop off lines (NOT just deer and turkeys, but the kids are JUST as hard to avoid). And lets not forget the Cop in all of this. He's negotiating some personnel changes at the old office, and yet every morning gets to be woken up by me, hair standing on end, eyes smeared with yesterdays mascara (and one twitching frantically), clutching a cup of coffee and smiling maniacally before briefing him on the day's activities. Parenthood is fun.

 

So now that we're on break, I'm pretty excited to say the least. This morning I actually slept in. It was crazy. And while laying in bed enjoying coffee and reviewing my Facebook memories (which they shove down your throat so you can remember how adorable your kids once were and get a little weepy about how now they are super loud and smelly) I got to reminisce about our Christmas Eve Eve's of years past. Two years stood out in particular, one seven years ago in which both boys had the stomach flu but at least all the presents were wrapped, and one five years ago where I had tonsillitis and the Cop and both Wild Boys had pink eye but at least all the presents were wrapped. The common theme seems to be disease and wrapped presents, so to fend it off I've wrapped absolutely no presents. So far so good. We may actually avoid some disease this year (standby, while I locate EVERY piece of wood in la Casa to knock on right now). The trick, thanks to Gabriel, will be avoiding injury. Because lets face it, the worst thing in the world is to deal with an extended family filled holiday while trying to minimize the spread of disease or accommodate stitches or casts, am I right?

 

I know, we've talked before about the dispensation for horrific injury here. To clarify, it has very little to do with clumsiness and a LOT to do with risk taking. This year, despite having already apparently irked Santa with some ill timed flatulence, Gabriel CONTINUES to live on the edge and risk a rocky holiday. Sometimes it's something as simple as crafting gone horribly, blisteringly wrong and necessitating hours of cold water soaking and some subsequent gross blister explosions.

 

 

And sometimes it's things like full on fist fights with his brother. Someone who probably really thought they were helping us anonymously mailed an Elf on the Shelf to our children, most likely in an effort to get them to behave. First off, to that person, you should probably maintain your anonymity because the Cop and I officially hate you. I don't want to make it seem super over dramatic or anything, but you legit ruined our lives. We ARE NOT Pinterest people, and if either Wild Boy asks me even one more time why other kids have elves that bring them toys and bake them wholesome, gluten free snacks on the daily whereas our elf just ends up hugging alcohol bottles and pooping in tiny toilets I WILL track down the sender of this curse and force you to come to my house every night to live up to these unrealistic expectations. And EVEN WITH the elf, these kids continue to push boundaries of naughtiness and injury. Particularly Gabriel. He seems to just not give an elf watching him and reporting back to Santa crap about sneaking in to places he's not supposed to be and risking death to be there.

 

Or, filling water balloons with ice, freezing them, then attempting to hide them for the next snow to conceal in a snowball and hit his poor unsuspecting brother with.

 

We are just two days away from Christmas at this point, and the Cop has decided to further tempt fate by lighting a burn pile visible from the International Space Station. So, so close to end game, and I know that the lure of open flames and the jinx factory that is me wrapping all the presents is stacking the odds against the Wild Boys making it until Christmas morning without hospitalization for sure. So I'm blogging to procrastinate, but I know I have to sign off and adult perilously soon. In preparation, I'm piping in smooth jazz and have the fireplace going. I can't actually physically restrain them, and apparently legally I can't slip Benadryl into their hot cocoa, but I can make this place super boring right?

 

Wish me luck. Until next time, happiest of holidays from la Casa!