Christmas Addict

‘Tis the season! I’m not a fan of Halloween, although I humor the kids to excess and, in return, I demand they humor me for Christmas. I have no idea why I like this holiday. I am never on top of things. My cards are almost always sent later than I planned, usually the cookies are too. Frequently I am done with the bulk of my shopping before Halloween, let alone Black Friday, Still-Going Saturday, Catch-a-Breath Sunday, and Cyber Monday; but I’m usually still wrapping Christmas Eve morning.

I prefer to get all the decorations up the day after Thanksgiving, but that hasn’t happened as planned in years and I have no idea why. Actually, I do have one clue. Things started going awry when the kids became old enough to genuinely help as opposed to “help” in that almost cute underfoot small child way. It seems teenagers make more work than toddlers. Who knew? All right, put your hands down.

The good thing about having teenagers (there are a few perks here and there) is that when I make spritz every year, I can make them work the cookie press. For those not of German descent, spritz are a mild flavored cookie that come from stiff dough that’s firm enough to break most of the cute modern cookie presses. If you make it right. You can cheat, and I’ve considered it. I have older relatives who can tell the difference, damn them. But it’s okay, I keep an old, metal, turn-screw style cookie press that I think was my grandmother's and may have come from the fatherland itself just for making the cookies with. And since using said torture device gives me carpal tunnel, I have two youngsters who still have all their cartilage and tendons to task with pressing the cookies into neat little tree, wreath, and star shapes. Sprinkle colored sugar on them, bake, then carefully pack them so they can be tossed to hell and back and broken in the mail. Voila! Christmas tradition.

Speaking of tradition, I have my grandmother’s old fake Christmas tree. When I was little we used to go out in the forest and cut down a tree. Grandma had no patience for that though. She’d had enough of pine needles on her carpet. Then having to take it down based on fire hazard instead of your time scale. And let’s not forget the pitch.

For the record, I agree. When my kids were little, we did the real tree thing a couple of times so they’d have the experience, although we don’t live close enough to any place where you can cut your own. I just had to tell them about bundling up until I could barely move and traipsing through snow banks up to my waist. They thought that sounded great. As a kid, I thought it was too. Looking back at it, I can’t imagine why I thought so.

Anyway, the kids got real trees a couple of times, then they were happy to help me put together my grandmother’s antique tree because we could leave that thing up for over a month! And the real trees you buy in the city lots don’t really smell like the pine trees you got in the woods. They’re old and dry by the time you get them. I put little scent packets under the tree so it’ll smell like a tree, then go burn candles elsewhere in the house that smell like other things so you only smell the tree where you’re supposed to smell the tree. It drives Hubby nuts to have every room have a designated scent for the holiday season. 

Antique trees are kind of a pain in case anyone’s wondering. Pretty, but a hassle. So one year Hubby got me a new tree. Pre-lit, multi-colored lights. It was nice. Except the next year I didn’t want multi-colored lights. So we got another one, pre-lit with white lights. Then the next year my son wanted a flocked tree. Then I had to have a small one for the kitchen. (I’m really not sure of the rational, just go with it, this is my holiday. And 'small' means four feet high, in case you're wondering.) And I have two more tabletop trees. The one with multi-colored lights got donated somewhere along the line, but I still have the rest. Oh, and now I have two more medium size ones to go outside, and a potted Norfolk pine in the master bathroom. And I have a different box of ornaments for every tree. I should tell you about my hangup with wreaths sometime.

Hi, I’m Tori and I’m a Christmas Addict.