Day Nineteen 2016

What is your Christmas shopping tradition?  Do you go early, look for the best deals, make a list? Are you a Black Friday shopper?  Cyber Monday?  Do you shop at craft fairs? Make all your gifts?

In the past few years I have become something of a last minute shopper.  I used to make lists, and have a plan, and I also used to enjoy going to the mall. So, since that is no longer true, I have a new sort of tradition.  I call it the “wait for last minute then run out and spend too much” method.  This method seems to cause my coworkers no amount of stress, for a month I have been fielding questions about what I am gifting Kat and the boys.  I have written about trying the something they need, something they want, something something else and something to read, and that works, unless they need more than one thing, or you can’t find a book for them when you are last minute shopping.  So my new method works better.

This is how it works; some night, pretty much right before Christmas, (like the night before Christmas eve for example) you gather up your whole family and drag take them to get dinner.  Pick someplace sort of affordable that everyone likes.  Remember you are going to be spending more than your budget allows so don’t go all crazy with a fancy dinner.  5 Guys Burgers is a good choice.

Then go to your favorite mega store.  We are fans of Target, but you do you.  Divide and conquer.  One parent takes one kid and the other parent takes the other kid.  I think we have done it were the kids go off on their own before, but not this year.  Leave your coat in the car, otherwise you get to hot in the store and irritable.  As you shop, if you see something you want for yourself, go ahead and add it to the cart.  Listen to the input of your children.  I never would have purchased onesie pajamas for my adult sized children without the input of the other child.  Also, I could have spent $60 on a video game for one child had the other child not shared that they were planning on getting it used, and that the child who wanted it had heard bad reviews about it so they were waiting. 

Then when you just can’t stand to be there anymore meet your family at checkout.  You probably want to do a count of gifts so that one child isn’t getting two gifts while the other is getting 12, but that may just be my family.

“Wait for last minute and spend too much” it is not too late for you to try it this year.

Day 15. Party Party Party

Our Party is less than a week away and once again we are less than ready.  This year we are having the party at the Fireman’s Hall, which makes it easier and also harder at the same time.  It is easier because I do not have to clean the house.  It is more difficult because I feel pressure to decorate the hall so that it looks as nice and beautifully appointed for the holidays as my home does, allegedly.  Also this year since we are asking people to bring things I don’t have the pressure of a million things to bake and/or cook to prepare, or to be more accurate, Kat doesn’t have that pressure.  However we still have a list of things, and not enough time to do it.

Not the Picture I was looking for, but still a delicious picture

This week I have several guest bloggers who will be sharing their memories of parties past, and more specifically what our Christmas party means to them.  I’ll be honest, I was a little misty when I read the blog entries.  When I recovered from my Sally Fields moment, (“They Like me!  They really like me!”) I realized that honestly I don’t spend much thought on what the party means to other people.  I really should because it has been broadcasted to me for years, Elisa was what? 8 the first time she let me know?  And yet somehow I manage to belittle our party and discount what it means to anyone other than Kat, the boys and me.

This year in addition to Jodi and Nicole blogging about the party I have received text messages from friends in Colorado who are very disappointed we have moved the party back to Oklahoma.  I still wonder how that can be since we only had 2 parties in Colorado and they were under attended, but I guess the lesson is that it is not about the quantity, it is all about the quality and Kathleen really knows how to put on a quality party.

So if you are in Oklahoma City, or you are planning on being in Oklahoma City on Saturday December 20^th and you have not received an invite, please let me know and I’ll correct that.

How the Grinch Stole Christmas - Day 10

What if it is not perfect?

Today I am struggling to come up with something to write about. My stomach is still iffy. I thought I was feeling better but then last night I got sick again, and would up staying home all day today. Yesterday I started a blog entry about the Kids Christmas party, but I think it sounds lame, so I shelved it for now.

Yesterday before I started feeling bad I did manage to get the tree and the ornaments up from the basement, but other than plugging the tree in, that is as far as it got. I thought maybe the boys could decorate and something magical could happen that I could write about. No such luck.

Which leads me to where we are now. What happens if all my best laid plans for something Christmassy get waylaid? What if nothing is ever perfect or clever again? I mean I realize it is not likely, but anything is possible. Sometimes it takes a lot of work to orchestrate these things, and what if the challenge of putting it all together and then remembering to blog about it later is too much for me?

I don’t pretend to be a real writer by any means. My sister Juliet? Went to school and has a masters in creative writing. She is a real writer. My childhood buddy Josh Brodesky? Wrote for the Az Daily Star and is now an Economy Reporter for the Arizona Republic. He is a writer. My College friend Rebecca Mize Harrell? Wrote for the Shawnee News Star after college. She is a writer. My friend sj Miller from HS? Wrote a book. Another writer. I am sure I know others, but those are the ones who come to mind. I am not even a real blogger like Jessica Kinney Hall or Heather Cook who do it regularly and make it look effortless. How do real writers do it?

Have I mentioned before that I get to/have to blog for work? I did a decent job for a year but then it sort of dropped off my priority list. I wonder if that is what is going to happen here? 3 years and then halfway through December 2012 I just stop.

I just asked my Matthew if it would be ok if I stopped blogging. He was shocked, SHOCKED that I would suggest that. I reminded him that he doesn’t read them, and he reminded me that he doesn’t need to, as they are ABOUT him, and he loves that. He says that is how he knows he is my “favorite”. And yes he used air quotes to say that.

Oh dear.

Holly Jolly 6mass

Topless Pasta Night, Christmas Style.

Sometimes I wonder if I will run out of things to blog about. Maybe my memory will finally give up and I will have nothing to go on? But then something happens like tonight and I think I can probably go on forever.

Kat and I have a very good friend named Heather. Heather was at OBU a year behind me, I met her just after her freshman orientation, Kat met her soon after that. Heather sang at our wedding, and was there for much of the trouble, I mean fun we had at OBU.

Just before Matthew was born, Heather moved back to Oklahoma City and we reconnected. To know Heather is to love her and both of my boys are enamored of her. As Matthew gets older it really makes me smile to see how similar those two September babies are.

When Paul was about four, he and Matthew VERY messy eaters, (not that this has changed). In an effort to reduce laundry stains and make for ease of clean up, when we had particularly messy foods for dinner, like spaghetti, it was often easier to let them take their shirts off before dinner. More than once, not wanting to get tomato sauce on my work shirts I joined them. And topless pasta night was born.


It was strictly a family event, and Kathleen prefers that I point out that although she cooked the meal, and ate the meal, not once did she ever engage in topless pasta night. One night as our family was eating dinner sans camisas, out of the blue my Paul innocently says, “how come we never have Heather come to dinner? We should invite her, and have spaghetti when she comes”. Heather is very proud of her hourglass figure so there is much humor in the idea of her joining us for topless pasta night and when we told her everyone got a good laugh.

The next time she came for dinner we did NOT have spaghetti, but we were having some noodle dish, and as we sat down at the table, my Paul shyly asked if we all needed to take our shirts off. Heather accused me of putting him up to it, but I was innocent. Again we all got a good laugh and for years we told that story and laughed.

Last year, when I was traveling back and forth to Denver so much Heather moved in and stayed with us for a season. She was a great help to Kathleen and she and the boys really bonded over some silliness. One of the silly things was that when Heather had been with us about a month, Kathleen made spaghetti for dinner, and right before Heather came to the table, my Matthew suggested we all take our shirts off and surprise her. So we did, and once again I got accused of setting that up. Kathleen and Heather laughed but declined to join in with the topless pasta night so we put our shirts back on.

I am sure you are all chuckling to read this, but what does it have to do with Christmas? Tonight at dinner we had spaghetti, and just as we were finished, Mathew whipped off his shirt and said, “Hey it is Topless Pasta Night!” I took his picture to send to Heather, or at least I tried to. Matthew and Paul got the giggles and I had a hard time getting a good shot.

This story has 3 morals. #1 I am not the lecherous old man I get credited for, and #2 Merle Jennings was right, the friends we made at OBU are for life, #3 Christmas silliness can be about anything.

22 down, 3 to Go!

Day 22, closing in!

I confess I am not feeling it today. Work has me down, but I am going to try and take off (sort of) tomorrow. At least I am not planning on coming in to work. Maybe that will help. I am putting Matthew’s rule “we do what has to be done” into effect, followed by a healthy dose of focus on the positive. . . Anyway, here we go!

In 2003 Kathleen’s parents moved to Oklahoma City. The first Christmas they were here they had just moved into their house, and were still getting things fixed up. The following year we had Christmas day with them. Over Thanksgiving we had ‘broken in’ the new table in their formal dining room. At that meal Nolen had made a proclamation that THIS table was the family table, and it is where we would eat important family meals, holidays, special occasions, celebrations for our family. It is a lovely table, big, ornate, and can expand and seat up to 20 or something extreme like that.

At Christmas that year, as we sat down to eat our Christmas meal the table looked great, Elisa had purchased new table linens that fit this new table and they were gorgeous. Her china on the new table linens was a place setting worthy of a magazine photo shoot. The table looked great, and food smelled heavenly.

After we held hands and blessed the food, Elisa asked 3 year old Matthew to please remember NOT to wipe his nose on his shirtsleeve. He assured her that he would not. Matthew sits across from me at this table, and his Grandmother sits between us at one end of the table. All through the meal I watched Matthew carefully and he was good to his word, not once did he wipe his nose on his sleeve.

After the meal I remarked to Kathleen that we should turn that Christmas dinner in to the “Priceless” commercial people.

New dining room table? $1600

Brand new table linens? $65

Seeing your son wipe his nose on the new table linens unbeknownst to his Gramma?

PRICELESS

Day Twenty-three

Last night we took the boys to do their Christmas shopping. In years past we have taken them to the dollar store and turn them loose. They both seem particularly fond of socks and coffee mugs as gifts, as their grandparents and my siblings can attest to. This year we went to a used book store. It certainly cost more than then $10 per kid the other would have, but I think they picked better gifts. At least more interesting gifts.
Matthew wanted to get his granparents a Photoshop for Dummies. I tried explaining to him that his grandparents do not even own a digital camera, but he patiently explained that they have lots of the the Dummies books already, so they must be reading the whole series. While I can appreciate the 8 year old logic in that statement, I steered him in another direction.
Paul looked in the cookbook section and was thinking Hotter Than Hell might be a good choice for Grampa Nolen and he really wanted to get the Skinny Bitch cookbook for his mother. I said no to both, even though I thought it would be funny to see those gifts unwrapped.
Another part of their gift giving tradition is that in the past they have insisted that their Grandmother Elisa needs one of those miniature christmas village houses every year. The tradition started the first year that she and Nolen moved to Oklahoma. Some former co-worker of Elisa’s had sent her a floral arrangement that came with a Thomas Kinkade lighted cottage. That year when we took them shopping Paul insisted that his grandmother loved that cottage and that she probably collects them. I was pretty sure the collecting part was not true, but I let him and Matthew choose small houses from the dollar store for Elisa. She very graciously put them out with the one she had already received.
That was just fuel to the fire. For months before christmas the boys are asking to check out the christmas village houses anywhere there is a display. They are very opinionated in their choices, and it takes a lot of discussion to make the final decision. The house can not be a Santa thing, and can not be decorated with a Christmas tree or anything like that, as they know their grandmother does not like that. To date they have given her a lighthouse (our church is refered to as the lighthouse on the corner so I think that is where that choice came from), a chinese restaurant, and two tiny churches they painted themselves. Elisa is a good sport, because she puts them up every year.
Last year we surprised her. Instead of a christmas village house I bought her a lladro figureen of two boys having a pillow fight. We placed it inside a tacky christmas vallage box and wrapped that. The boys agreed the surprise aspect of that gift balanced out not getting to pick a Christmas house.

Day Eightteen

In 1999 we traveled for the holidays. Paul was 20 months old and we drove to Missouri for Thanksgiving with my grandparents and Dad and Aunt Joy and Uncle Dale and various cousins. Then for Christmas we traveled to Santa Fe for Christmas Eve, and then Christmas morning we drove to Parker Colorado. That is a LOT of driving for one family, and a lot of car seat time for Paul. Luckily, Paul is a pretty laid back traveler even then.

We got to Santa Fe around 2pm on Christmas Eve. We hung out at my Dad’s house with my brother Ben, (Dad was already in Colorado with his sister Pat and my sister Jenni). That evening Kat, Paul, Ben and I went to Christmas Eve service at First Baptist Church Santa Fe, which had been my church home when I was in HS, and the church Ben grew up in.

The service was nice and very familiar. Paul thought it was a little long, and so at least twice he climbed down from the pew and out into the aisle and ran for the door. Ben was fast on his feet and went after him both times and scooped him up and brought him back and did his best to keep him entertained during the service. When church was over we shook some hands and then we were headed for the door when Earlene Groseclose stopped me at the door and said how sweet to see us again, and what a beautiful family and all those nice things people usually say. Then she said that she really enjoyed seeing Ben run after Paul because it didn’t seem like that long ago that I had been chasing after Ben as he made a break for it. That made me feels good.

Then we went to Pojoaque to Ben’s Mom’s for a traditional New Mexican Christmas Eve dinner of red and green chile enchiladas. I told Rebecca what Earlene had said and that I thought it was sweet. She agreed it was sweet that what was remembered about me and Ben, and what brought those memories rushing back, was basically bad behavior and parents who couldn’t keep their kids sitting still in church.

Don’t judge. Sarcasm and bad behavior in church is just how us Kinkade’s roll.

Day Eleven

On the eleventh day of Christmas. . .

Alright, I admit it I actually started writing these the last week of November and I had the first 8 days or so already completed before the 1st so that if I couldn't think of anything I would be ok. Except then I got busy and didn't really stay as far ahead as I planned and I think I only have one or two more days. So we will see how well I do from this point on.

Christmas Eve dinner enchiladas have been a tradition for my family as long as I can remember. When I moved to Arizona with my Mom and Jenni we were already doing it. My Mom’s favorites were her infamous spinach enchiladas. While those were tasty, I know Jenni was not a huge fan. Her complaint was that they tasted like raw spinach and tortillas with cheese and enchilada sauce. This is not an absolutely untrue statement. I am a big fan of Kathleen’s version of Christmas Eve enchiladas. She makes both red and green, and fills them with cheese, onions and chicken, even though her Mom insists that enchiladas do not have meat.

When Jenni and I were still kids living in Tucson, one of our traditions, in addition to the enchiladas and multiple Christmas eve church services was ‘re-hanging’ the tinsel on the tree when my Mom was not around. It was so much more fun to stand back and throw the shiny tinsel at the tree than it was to carefully drape it over the branches, one silver strand at a time. Once the tree was decorated, when Mom wasn’t around we would take the tinsel off the tree and do it our way.

One Christmas Eve Jenni and I were ‘re-hanging’ tinsel in the living room while Mom was in her room wrapping presents. We were supposed to be finishing our enchiladas, but we had brought our plates in from the kitchen and had set them on the couch while we were busy with the tree. We had Mom’s old Firestone Christmas albums playing on the record player, (sort of like an old school cd player that involved needles, for those born after 1980).

We were dressed for church and were probably minutes away from leaving for a candlelight service. That year Jenni had a red velvet skirt that my Dad’s mom had made for her. Jenni loved it because Grandmother made it, and also because when she spun around the skirt twirled out really big. So there we were listening to Christmas tunes, throwing tinsel, and Jenni was spinning around in the living room, making it merry and bright.

Eventually the noise level got a little too loud and Mom came back into the living room. Jenni was mid spin when Mom walked in so she immediately went from spinning to flopping down on the couch. I am sure her intent was to declare her innocence in the whole affair and pin the blame on me. It might have had better results had she not sat down on her plate of enchiladas.

Guess what does not come easily out of red velvet? Red enchilada sauce, that is what.

When Mom stopped laughing she helped Jenni clean up the mess and after Jenni had changed into jeans Mom asked what had we learned from this experience.
I went with the safe bet of ‘not to eat dinner in the living room’, after discarding ‘not to throw tinsel at the tree’ and ‘no turning the record player up past 5’. Jenni said ‘don’t put your butt in your dinner plate if that is the last serving of enchiladas’

Let that be a lesson to all of us this year.