Christmas Greeting

When I got home from work last night, I suddenly felt like I was written into the script of Christmas Vacation. I went into the front room to water the tree and realized that my tree skirt and the two oversized bath towels beneath it were drenched. Immediately, I grabbed one of my wrapped presents sitting on top of said wetness, only to find the paper ruffled and damp. I tore into it and the present inside - a very special book I made - was ruined. The pages were wet and wavy and the binding was separated from the hard cover. The next three gifts - same special books - had damp wrapping paper, and wavy pages too, but the bindings were still intact. All in all, seven of the ten presents under the tree were soggy, and as I pulled the pretty red and green papers off of each of them, I ugly cried. I was so happy Travis wasn't home yet. I didn't want him to witness that.

I'm so upset about the books. They are the culmination of two years of scanning and editing my old family Polaroids, and obviously they mean a lot to me. Plus, that's $200 worth of books! I left the wet wrapping paper mess laying in the front room and just crawled into bed last night and cried. Trav came home an hour later, saw the mess and thought we'd been robbed. He hurried down the hall to make sure the computer was still on the desk, and then found me in bed. He cheered me up and then ran to Target and bought a new tree stand, specifically one that wouldn't leak. We awkwardly moved/dragged the Christmas tree and the new stand across the room, ornaments and all, so the carpet beneath the original spot could dry, and tonight, we'll move it all back. And then I'll re-wrap my seven presents, and tomorrow when I give the books to my family, I'll explain my Christmas tree disaster and apologize for the wrinkly pages. The one book that is completely ruined is now my copy of our Polaroid book, and my dry copy that was in the other room far away from a leaky tree stand, is now going to be wrapped and given away.

After all is said and done, it's really a funny story. We laughed about it last night. We joked about waking up this morning and finding the tree and its brand new stand tipped over and broken, and wondered if anything else would go wrong with the Christmas decorations. So when I left for work this morning, it should come to no surprise that our white twinkly lights outside have mysteriously turned themselves off. They're all plugged in. They're just off. Curious.

Despite seemingly major disasters and little unusual snags, our Christmas will be wonderful and fun and joyous, and I hope yours is too.

The last of the Christmas videos... Day 10, Day 11, and the finale, Day 12. Hope you enjoyed them!