Grown up, but still a kid

Friday was a good day. It was the kind of day that comes and goes and when you look back on it, you think, "Man, I loved that day." And it wasn't that anything amazing happened, but the gathering of all the little memories makes for one big nice one.

My parents were in because sick kids prevented us from traveling last weekend. So, I decided it was finally my turn to cook Christmas dinner. My first turkey and all the accompanying dishes. It's a dizzying task; coordinating what goes in first, at what temperature, for how long,etc. I'm really glad my mom was there to help me navigate the unknown paths. However, she did not take over, make suggestions or changes, or look exasperated at me once. She sat over at the dining room table looking amused for most of the day. And my Dad, who can't sit still unless there's an old western on the tube, came in and did all the chopping, dicing, and cubing for the recipes. I'm so grateful not to have cubed the sweet potatoes! So at that one point, it was me and Dad, who's busy, but unobtrusive presence are both positive and endearing.

And when it was all done, we sat down to a dinner table that looked completely alien to us.

A roasted turkey (who has his own story from being frozen the morning I started cooking to not quite done when I took him out of the oven) that I made by combining recipes I found from Martha Stewart and The Barefoot Contessa. Just a friendly note here; if you've never made your own turkey before, you can't just buy it the night before and expect to cook it early the next morning. It has to thaw for days.

A corn casserol and sweet potato casserole I found on the internet.

A Yankee Stuffing recipe (Horror #1) made from sourdough bread instead of cornbread (Horror #2) that I found on - wait for it - a BLOG (Oh, the horror!).

There was only one pie, not enough wine for dinner because we started drinking it at 10:00 that morning, and we forgot to open the can of cranberry sauce.

But, my family being the amazing people they are, all ate without making any comments about how different my meal was from our traditional Christmas dinner. Everyone had something nice to say (even Pearce and Cole) and we enjoyed our meal.

I was feeling very happy about having completed and eaten my first Christmas dinner. I was feeling very grown up. I felt very much the matriarch at that moment. And then my mom walked up to me and looked me in the eyes and said, "I'm proud of you." The feeling of being grown up didn't disappear, but I enjoyed the rush of child-like warmth to hear her say those words. In that moment, I was both grown up, but still a kid.

Worry chorizo

I worry. It's kind of what I do. I worry I'm not a good mom. A good wife. A good friend. A good person. A good Christian. Sometimes my worry overwhelms me and when I become overwhelmed, I feel out of control. That's the worst. Being out of control. Feeling helpless and hopeless is like holding my breath. Or like when my brother used to roll me up into a blanket so tight that I couldn't unroll myself.

Sometimes I'm overwhelmed by noise. By responsibility. By expectations. By anger. By jealousy. When I'm out of control of myself in these ways, it's like being wrapped too tightly in a guilt blanket. I become a guilt chorizo.

Tonight, I walked a prayer labyrinth; which is something I've never done. I asked God to tell me what to pray about. As I approached the center, I was focusing on all the above things - the things that wrap me up. The words 'out of control' came to mind and on their heels, the words, 'God is in control.'

This isn't a Christmas miracle post. My epiphany won't change the circumstances that cause my worry nor their frequency. And I don't know that I'm going to stop worrying or feeling less out of control. But, knowing that God is never out of control gave me peace. Peace that is still with me. Peace I can pass on. Peace that might still be in me the next time the blanket of guilt and worry comes calling.

God is in control.

Tomorrow, I will worry, even though I don't need to and it doesn't do any good. I will worry about my 12-year-old having his first girlfriend. About my sick great-aunt. About money. About singing off key at church. About cooking my first Christmas goose.

But God will not worry.

There is peace in that.

Psalm 46

1 God is our refuge and strength,
an ever-present help in trouble.
2 Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way
and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea,
3 though its waters roar and foam
and the mountains quake with their surging.

4 There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God,
the holy place where the Most High dwells.
5 God is within her, she will not fall;
God will help her at break of day.
6 Nations are in uproar, kingdoms fall;
he lifts his voice, the earth melts.

7 The LORD Almighty is with us;
the God of Jacob is our fortress.

8 Come and see what the LORD has done,
the desolations he has brought on the earth.
9 He makes wars cease
to the ends of the earth.
He breaks the bow and shatters the spear;
he burns the shields[d] with fire.
10 He says, “Be still, and know that I am God;
I will be exalted among the nations,
I will be exalted in the earth.”

11 The LORD Almighty is with us;
the God of Jacob is our fortress.

Sneaky Stocking Stalkers

I love my childhood stocking. My Dad’s mom made it and it’s the symbol of Christmas magic to me. The stocking is my favorite part of Christmas morning. No matter how many presents were under the tree, Christmas always felt like it started when we, wide-eyed with anticipation, carefully pulled out each treasure from within the stocking. And Christmas always felt like it ended when the last item had been dug out, the bottom of the stocking checked, rechecked, and triple checked for emptiness. There were still presents under the tree, and I loved them, but the anticipation and excitement of the stocking was unrivaled.

You remember how hard it was to go to sleep on Christmas Eve? Knowing that Santa was coming and yet knowing he wouldn’t come until I fell asleep was torture. It was like taking a NoDoz and a sleeping pill and hoping for the best. You know you need to sleep, but can’t. One Christmas, I had a particularly hard time staying asleep. My bedroom was on the second floor and opened to a balcony that overlooked the entire living room. Each time I’d awaken, I’d sneak out to see if Santa had come. On the third time, there it was. The Stocking. And although Santa had most likely brought me something awesome that was sitting out in plain sight, I couldn’t see anything else but the glittery, beckoning, felt and sequined embodiment of temptation. There’s something spectacular about the heft and shape of a filled stocking. My stocking had a rosy-cheeked Santa who always looked so fat and jolly when he was stuffed.

I deftly made my way downstairs and dared to peer into the depths of its wonder. I could see a Hello Kitty emblem, the traditional Book of Lifesavers, something fuzzy, and then…was that the top of a Star Wars figure? I could see the logo; I knew the familiar cardboard box. But I couldn’t quite see which character. I oh-so gently removed the top item from the stocking. I swear the sound of a Life Saver box coming out of a felt stocking was like a jet engine in the living room. I removed the Hello Kitty stationery set. Did it have bells on it? It was so loud! I removed the fuzzy thing and there it was. Luke Skywalker in the orange X-wing suit. I lovingly removed him from his sleeping place and marveled at him. Santa was truly amazing. I decided not to press my luck and place everything back in the stocking, but realized as I put Luke back that there was the bottom of a Star Wars figure box further down. Two Star Wars characters! Oh, Santa, surely I was naughtier than to deserve two! And that was it, the stocking was completely emptied and I sat among my loot so happy. An orange Luke Skywalker and a Chewbacca. I’m still aglow with the memory of that moment.

I replaced the items in my stocking, too caught up in my reverie to replace them in the correct sequence. That Christmas came and went and the next year, I made my trip downstairs to look at the stocking in the dead of night. To my surprise, everything on the top of the stocking was crinkly or honestly covered in bells. So, Santa knew. It felt like it took me an hour that year to go through my stocking noiselessly. I learned to replace the toys exactly as they came out, but it didn’t matter. Each year after that, Santa placed the noisiest treasures at the top of the stocking and each thing within it was put together like Jenga. One year, there was even a toy that spoke loudly when I moved it.

I don’t remember when my yearly sneaking tradition stopped, but it was well into high school. It’s a fond memory that my parents and I laugh at now, although I never dared to tell them when I was a child in case they had ways of communicating with Santa. My kids aren’t afraid of Santa, though; because they confessed to me that they have been planning and executing midnight raids on their stockings for the last few years. Strangely, knowing their secret keeps the magic going for me.

Tinsel stress

Reminiscing 'Wonder Years' style is hard to do when your parents are still alive (and reading your blog), so I hope my mom forgives me for this post. I hope she reads it in the voice of the guy who wrote and narrated 'A Christmas Story.' Otherwise, I might be presentless this Christmas.

Today, I hung tinsel on the Christmas tree. It was Chad's request. It was something he remembered fondly about the trees of his childhood. And as I opened the package, I was suddenly aware that I hadn't hung tinsel in all my adult life. Had it gone out of fashion? Had I just been too lazy to do it all these years? Who knew.

As I pulled out the first strands of tinsel, the stress came back in a vertigo shot (you know that shot in a movie where the actor suddenly realizes something and the background zooms while the actor stays the same size?) I flashed back to myself from probably 4th grade to my senior year of high school. The trimming of the tree in my house was a looked-forward-to event that always seemed to have a dark side.

There was the lighting nightmare. Year after year my father cursed and growled at the tangled mass of Christmas tree lights in his hands. They seemingly had no end or beginning. Or they had so many ends sticking out from every direction that he had no idea where to start. Every year he tried a new method of putting them away that might yield less stress the next year. There was the lights around the coffee can year. The lights around the extension cord frame year. There was even a year when dad was ahead of his time and just put the tree up with the lights still in it. Thank goodness for pre-lit trees. They saved our family.

There was the yearly garland conundrum, where mom tried new and innovative ways to strand the garland. Up and down the tree. Sort of tucked into the tree. Plain slapped onto the tree (when Derrick was in charge).

There was the ornament instruction each year. Ornaments were to be hung evenly from front to back and top to bottom. My ornaments were rehung every year as I never quite seemed to grasp the spacial concept my mom was going for.

But among all these stresses, none topped the tinsel. I dreaded tinsel time like no other. There were rules about how many strands were in one toss. There was a wrist flick method that escaped my mastery. There was the 'purposeful randomness.' You know what I'm talking about? My mom wanted the tinsel to look randomly placed - in a perfect way. We spent more time trying to make the tinsel look whimsical than we spent getting the tree out of the attic, watching dad hurl expletives around the room while lighting the tree, and all the decorating prior to tinsel time. I never got it right. I'd toss a clump of tinsel. Or I'd let too much fall to the floor. Inevitably, my mom would relieve me from tinsel duty and exasperatedly strip me of my box of tinsel. I can close my eyes and see my mom with the tinsel in her hand - alone because the rest of us were more afraid of her in that moment than we were when Dad was in his scariest lighting rant. She was the Cruella de Vil of tinsel. Maniacally flicking her wrist and reworking where the errant strands had randomly landed to make them look more random.

At the end of the night, when the stress of the tree trimming was over and my mom and dad had had a chance to recover, we looked in awe at our tree. It was always magical. Perfectly whimsical. Sparkly and mesmerizing. And my mom always got up every morning after it was decorated to plug in the lights so that as I came into the living room each morning through Christmas, the shiny, beautiful tree was there to greet me. And the tinsel sparkled happily and I didn't remember the stress of its conception.

Until today. And instead of stressing, I smiled, threw clumps of tinsel this way and that, and concocted this blog post while I worked.

A letter to the squatters in my home

Dear Germs,

I learned in a writing class in college that it’s best to start any letter with a compliment. In the spirit of creative letter-writing, I offer you this; you are indeed very powerful and tenacious. Your patience in waiting until one of my children is well to strike the others is pure evil genius.

I admit you’ve had your run of my house. You’ve had us sleepless with worry, frantically calling in grandparents for help, and constantly doling out money to our family doctor and the Green Oaks 24-hour Walgreens pharmacy. Your presence has led my doctor to make jokes about naming a wing of his office after us. Sure, laugh it up.

I have no doubt you are feeling rather smug about it all. We missed out on working at our church’s pumpkin patch, a fall festival, Trunk-Or-Treat, and Halloween altogether because of you. We missed a Halloween hayride party we go to every year because of you. We narrowly escaped your grasp at Thanksgiving – but were on antibiotics to combat your efforts to infiltrate us again. We missed two Christmas parties because of you. And now, we are manically trying to rid our house of you before Christmas starts in earnest.

I don’t allow the word ‘hate’ in my house, so I’ll say this; I abhor you. I loathe you. I detest you.

However, looking at the future with optimistic hope, I know your presence now almost guarantees my household freedom from your reign later. I know my youngest two boys will have the immune system that resembles Godzilla and your effectiveness will be something akin to Tokyo. You will fight with your armies of germs, but my kids’ adaptive immunity will annihilate you. What, not laughing now? You’ve already lost your hold on Pearce and Cole. You, with all your pathogenic schemes, haven’t been able to penetrate their stronghold of layered defense. It’s called immunological memory, my friend. Pearce and Cole’s bodies see you coming. And they giggle at you. That’s right. You are like a toddler playing Red Rover with the 1985 Chicago Bears* defensive line.

So, please enjoy your time, albeit short-lived, with my youngest two. Because soon, you will be an unpleasant, but distant memory.

Without regard,

Dori

*Anyone over 40 might argue that the 1970s Steel Curtain defense would have been a better example, but I’m a generation younger and the 85 Bears won the Super Bowl, so I ultimately chose them. Oh, and it’s my blog, so there.

Craftiness

I realized something this week while talking to a friend at work. I neither flaunt my girliness nor exploit my tomboyishness. So, I've made a decision to relate to my all-male household by learning how to fish and committing to camping (an activity I loved as a child). However, my family will have to excuse me while I 'fill up' the girly gas tank.

I decided to give crafting a try. I found a great How-To magazine and tore out several articles. I also found a few blogs that have amazing crafts. I'm not bragging. My first attempts at craftiness are pretty sad, but I know it'll get better (and the seams straighter) as I gain some experience. And there's the problem. My lack of attention span and impulsivity almost guarantee that these are the first and only attempts at these particular crafts. The gift tag took an hour. Who wants to spend an hour making gift tags? And the candle I'm turning over to my oldest boys to make as crafts for their teachers. I might reproduce the camera strap a few more times with alternate colors. If you need one, let me know and I'll make you one. You know, as long as straight seams aren't a big deal to you.

Here are the first attempts.




I actually like the way this one turned out. The kind of craft that doesn't have to have perfectly straight lines. I used tissue paper instead of all fabric and I think that'll look nice as it's burning.




DIY camera strap cover! It's kind of large and the seams aren't pretty. At all. But it looks decent in the picture! I made one for Baxter's strap and one for Baxter's older sister, Dee70 (shown here).





The gift tag that took an hour. Never, and I repeat, NEVER again. If your present has this gift tag on it, know that it represents an hour of my life. I hope that knowledge makes up for what is probably a poorly-made, hand-crafted gift.