Next Year Everyone Is Getting a Lobstergram

1. We finished our holiday shopping last weekend, which was pretty good considering we didn't start until the weekend of Dec. 6th. It only took one episode of us screaming at each other in the mall parking lot, two online orders, one case of me speaking to Ryan through gritted teeth in the middle of the bookstore, eight eggnog lattes and twenty-six apologies to do it. I cannot count how many lessons we learned this year. They were not fun lessons, but valuable; we already have a plan of attack for next year's holiday gifting, one which thankfully does not rely on my speedy completion of handicrafts or Ryan's ability to refrain from cracking jokes when I am already pissed off.

2. Those same gifts that were nearly the cause of a divorce were supposed to be wrapped Saturday night/Sunday afternoon, packaged up, and taken to the post office on Monday. We bought The Golden Compass to watch while wrapping Saturday night. Not much in the way of actual wrapping and packaging got done. From the big pile of stuff, three things got wrapped, none of which are being mailed anywhere. His parents' present (a collection of photos in a frame) is not even half done and although Ryan assures me that he'll figure out some way to ship a picture frame with four glass panels in it, he has yet to come up with any useful ideas. Mostly what happened Saturday was we tried to wrap things together, then I got bossy and Ryan got mad, so he retired to the couch to play with his new deck of trick cards and I spent several hours saying "PIPER! GET DOWN NO! STOP TOUCHING THAT! GET OFF THE TABLE! PUT THE SCISSORS DOWN! BRING THAT BACK HERE! STOP EATING THAT! LEAVE IT ALONE! FOR THE LOVE OF GOD STOP POKING THE CAT WITH THE SCISSORS! DON'T TOUCH THAT! DON'T TOUCH DON'T TOUCH DON'T TOUCH DON'T TOUCH PUT IT BAAAAAAAAAACK!"

3. It is now Thursday and not a single thing has been wrapped all week. Ryan keeps responding with his usual "chill out, wouldja?" attitude when I explain every day that I need some (expletive) time without the baby in the house so I can (expletive) wrap the (expletive) presents so I can take them to the (expletive) post office because they are already going to be (expletive) late. The holiday season has not been good for my resolve to curse less (so that our exceptionally observant parrot daughter doesn't start repeating the f-word in public).