5 Things Friday

Hey hey, it's the last Friday before Christmas! Here's what is on my mind today.

1. Paul's last day of school was last Friday, December 15th (he goes back 1/2). Isn't that SO EARLY for school to be out for the holidays? I swear "back in my day" we would have gone until the 23rd. I'm now of the age where I can torment my children with "back in my day" comments. How did that happen? But I digress! Luckily the after school program provides childcare for many of the non-school days. So he's there all this week and Wednesday and Thursday of next week. On Wednesday he got to go snow tubing (on fake snow because we still don't have snow - hurrah!). He told me "it was the best day of my life!!" Don't you love the enthusiasm of kindergarteners? I want to bottle it up and inhale it.

They captured a photo of him in his snow tube

2. Things are not exactly going swimmingly around these parts, though. Yesterday morning I got the dreaded "your child has just thrown up" call from daycare. Le sigh. Taco had had a rough morning but it's really hard to differentiate between something being off and his intense displeasure with mornings. We had taken his temp (no fever) and done a covid test (negative) just to make sure he wasn't sick. But it seems like all signs pointed to him being fine and just mad about having to leave the house at 7. He didn't throw up again after he got home so it seems to be a short-lived bug or a fluke? Now I cross my fingers and pray that no one else is struck.

3. If I had to describe our holiday plans in one word, I'd choose "precarious." Besides worrying/watching for signs of a stomach bug, we are going to test both boys and Phil for covid tomorrow morning. If they are negative (I assume Taco will be negative since he was yesterday morning), my MIL will come to our house that afternoon and we'll go to a Christmas Eve gathering at Phil's cousin's house on Sunday. If anyone is positive - or pukes in the next 24ish hours - it will be just the 4 of us, a la Christmas 2020 without a nursing infant that ate around the clock. I have to remind myself of that because even though it would suck to not celebrate with family, at least I'll sleep well and not have bodily fluids leaking from my body (but may be cleaning up the bodily fluids of Paul if he gets what Taco has?)? I’m clearly reaching for a sense of perspective. The Christmas Eve gathering is my absolute favorite part of our Christmas celebrations so I really hope the boys are healthy and we can celebrate as planned. Send us all of your healthy vibes, please.

4. Speaking of covid, I have fully recovered. I credit it all to Paxlovid. It made such a huge impact on my symptoms so I highly recommend getting a prescription if you come down with covid!

5. It seems like the word for this time of year for most moms is "harried." Dare I say it hasn't had a harried vibe for us (outside of all the illness but that's a different kind of harried)? But that's the beauty of only having 2 kids and being gift minimalists. Don't feel sorry for our boys, though. They will get PLENTY of things from extended family. Each boy is getting about 3-4 things from us and then their Santa gifts are joint gifts. They need each other to play with said joint gifts - Don't Break the Ice and a bucket of balls and a baseball bat - so hopefully they are fine with joint gifts. A bat and balls is usually not a great play for Christmas since it's usually cold and snowy here, but the boys both have winter birthdays, so there isn't a great time to give a baseball-centric gift. But hey - it's going to be like 40 here on Christmas so kind of spring-like!

Bonus photo:

I don’t have to do any holiday baking because my mom sent us a big Tupperware bin of cookies plus heath candy and peanut brittle! The boys were excited about the cookies!

How are you feeling as we enter the final days before Christmas (for those who celebrate)? Has this been a harried month for you? I think the fact that I haven’t traveled since December 7th has really helped!