FROM KIDS
- Once the tree is in or on the car/out of the box, beg mom to hang ornaments all day long.
- Cry when you don't get to do it right now because you have to wait for your brother(s) to nap, get out of school, finish eating, take a dump, etc.
- Hang ornaments for 5 minutes, then lose interest and run away, leaving mom with ornament blue balls. Just kidding, we knew we were going to have to finish [it] off ourselves, anyway.
- Stake your claim on a one-foot-square area of the approximately ninety-foot-square (very rudimentary math- I'm literally guessing) tree.
- ALL of your ornaments MUST be hung ONLY in that one-foot square.
- The ornaments HAVE to be touching.
- Repeated commands from mom to space out the ornaments shall be ignored.
Sigh. Six ornaments in a 9-inch-square area. But I like one-eyed Gingerbread man. It's as if he's winking; like he's saying, "It's okay, Mama. I'm down with the touching. I'm grabbing Santa's ASS right now. He's making out his naughty list, and I'M ON IT."
- Drop 80% of the breakable ornaments, and 0% of the unbreakable ones.
- Be in utter denial that the ornaments are not actually toys.
- When mom says, "Aww, this ornament is from when I was one year old! Can you believe that Mama was ever one year old?" ask, in all seriousness, "When was that? Nineteen twenty?"
- Completely ignore the look of horror on mom's face.
- Fight with the brothers over who gets to hang mom's ballerina ornament (from, apparently, 1920), not because you actually want to hang the GIRLY ornament (OH THE HORROR), but because you want to WIN.
- Completely ignore the look of horror on mom's face.
- Fight with the brothers over who gets to hang mom's ballerina ornament (from, apparently, 1920), not because you actually want to hang the GIRLY ornament (OH THE HORROR), but because you want to WIN.
FROM PARENTS
- Totally regret giving your child(ren) any kind of time frame for when the ornaments will be hung. Next year it will be vague answers of "someday," then surprise them when it's actually time.
- Mix a stiff, large, stiff, extra large drink beforehand.
- Remind yourself that you will just rehang the ornaments after they go to bed. Stop nagging about spacing them! They don't listen anyway.
- Remember, the more ornaments the kids break, the less you have to hang next year. "Have," as in both "have to" and "have," as in, physically possess.
- Every ornament hung earns you one giant gulp sip of your drink. It's the Christmas SPIRIT(S)!
- Keep your sense of humor when the 1920 reference breaks out. The drink helps a lot with that.
- Smirk when they fight over ornaments. Because smirking is all there is left to do, outside of crying.
- Smirk when they fight over ornaments. Because smirking is all there is left to do, outside of crying.
- Remember that you only have like 10 more times to do this with them before they completely lose interest or move out. This is what memories are made of. Either cry or jump with joy, depending on your personality. Or mood at the time. (No judging here.)
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