Kriss Miss

So started out the Christmas season with a fabulous gift at my company's annual staff luncheon. There is a tradition of doing a White Elephant, spending a few hours getting sloshed on champagne and exchanging useless gifts with people we work with, but wouldn't necessarily choose to lunch with. Such fun. I ended up with - of all things - the"Slipper Genie" - basically slipper dusters - A must have for the multi tasker such as myself. And yes, all sarcasm aside, I actually am using them. I would have much rather had the Starbucks gift card, but this is infinitely more practical.

Oh yeah, I'm sick again. I believe that's my 7th cold since the twins were born, but who's counting? I am sort of always in a state of congestion, sometimes it hits full blown, sometimes it's stays on the periphery, but it's always there. No amount of Purell can fend off the amount of germs I am bombarded with on a daily basis. Welcome to my world.

New Year's was ok. Went into SF to see Cake (my favorite band, despite the fact that they haven't had a hit in over 5 years). We found a great college girl from craigslist to babysit. Senior at SF State, has her ECE cert. and CPR trained. She was wonderful, got rave referrals, etc. I was a bit nervous using a stranger, but I checked her out thoroughly, one of the perks of working in real estate. She was as stellar as everyone said she was but didn't come cheap. Easy money for her as all 3 kids were asleep when she arrived at 8 pm and none of them made a peep in our absence.

In planning my NYE, I didn't really anticipate how tired I would be, I had a hard time keeping from nodding off at the concert. I kept thinking, who am I fooling. I have no business trying to stay up until midnight. I think my days of "going out" such as this are over. At least until the kids are out of the baby stage.

Both boys are crawling now, thus limiting my online time greatly. In my waking hours, I am either feeding babies, chasing babies, changing diapers, preparing food, cleaning the kitchen floor (where said babies drop bits of food - we need a dog!) or doing laundry. This is my life. I do manage to get out to movies now and then (after the kids are in bed) but my movie buddy is 38 weeks pregnant with #2 and 4 cm dilated, so I suspect my movie going days are over.

Sofia had a blast during Christmas. She keeps telling me she wants do "Kriss Miss" again. I was overjoyed to explain to her that it only comes once a year.

Did pretty well this Christmas, no complaints. Lots of gift cards and chocolate. What more could one ask for? You know your life has changed when you get the excited, sick, puppy love feeling in the pit of your stomach over a...refrigerator...or even better...new, high capacity front loading washers and dryers. I almost can't contain my excitement.

Steve had the bad sense to actually ask me what was wrong with the ones we have. I almost didn't know how to respond as the question was so absurd. Firstly, because we've already had the conversation several times, but primarily because I regularly almost knock him over on my quest to get in yet another load of laundry or move the load that's in there to the dryer so I can do ...yet another load (average 3 a day). Must keep the laundry moving. We have a teeny, meant-for-one-single-person-not a-family-of-5 - miniature stackable. He doesn't understand.

I had to explain to him that I don't enjoy being in a constant state of laundry, that this situation will only get worse as the children...well...grow. Then, he had the bad taste to suggest we go to the laundromat once a week. Yes, a fabulous idea! Why didn't I think of that? A mother of 3 under 3, I have a few hours to spare. Natch! I honestly felt like smacking him in the head at that point.

Needless to say, I am clutching my 2 Best Buy gift cards in my dry, copious-amounts-of Purell soaked, cracked hand and getting ready to order my new appliances. Be still my heart.