Sometimes the stars align so perfectly in the worst possible way for parents…
I am reminded of this memory (Thanks Facebook) from a few years back when just such a thing happened.
…and so with that, I present… the great Christmas Tree caper of 2019…
——————————
[Day after Thanksgiving – 2019]
I failed at parenting on Friday….
Black Friday.
Let me tell you about all the failing that happened.
So the night before, Jonah ripped open the box of a 500-piece puzzle around bedtime and wanted to put it together.
It’s something he loves that doesn’t involve staring at a screen for hours. So that’s a good thing.
But it was also bedtime.
So as a compromise, We worked on the puzzle for a few minutes with him before putting both the boys to bed.
Then for no particular reason, we (me and mama) stayed up trying to finish the puzzle. But the stupid thing was too hard. It was past midnight when we finally called it quits. The puzzle still wasn’t finished.
So of course, at zero dark-thirty, Jonah waltzed into my bedroom and kicked me out of my bed. I tried to lug myself downstairs and just sleep on the couch but then the little sleep murderer followed me down. I never fell back asleep. And neither did Jonah.
All this to say that on Friday, people were tired.
I was tired. He was tired. We were tired.
There wasn’t enough coffee in the world for Friday.
So first thing that morning, we started the puzzle again.
Jonny wanted to help out but Jonah did not want him to help.
He SCREAMED at him to stop helping.
Jonny started to cry. “I just want to help too!”
I told Jonah that Jonny could help too.
Jonah would not accept this. (Sometimes this happens with Jonah. It’s just Something we deal with as an Ausome family)
Jonah escalated into a full-blown meltdown. He started screaming and slapping me in the face, but wanted me to hold him at the same time.
Jonny broke down into tears because he thought it was all his fault and ran to his room crying.
I hadn’t even finished my first cup of coffee y’all.
It wasn’t even 8am..
I went up to Jonny’s room and reassured him that everything was okay. It wasn’t his fault that Jonah was crying…
And then I decided we just needed to redirect like… THE WHOLE DAY.
So I asked the boys if they wanted to put up the Christmas Tree (the puzzle had been finished) and both boys enthusiastically said YES!
(Score one for Dad with the successful redirection)
So we started the process of putting up the tree.
We rearranged the living room. We vacuumed and swept and had it all prepared to put up the tree..
But I forgot a minor detail…
We didn’t actually HAVE a Christmas Tree.
The cats destroyed our tree last year and I took it to the dump last summer. I had completely forgotten about it.
And any little thing was setting my kids off about now…
So… yeah.
We needed a Christmas Tree. Our sanity DEPENDED on this tree.
I could have picked ANY redirection activity and I chose THIS.
So We needed a freaking tree.
And I can’t think of a worse thing to do when your kids are barely holding on to their sanity than taking them out in PUBLIC while they are barely holding on to their sanity…
…especially to a store…
…on the busiest shopping day of the year.
🤬
I had ZERO intentions of going anywhere that day. Certainly not anywhere remotely close to any shopping places.
And we don’t DO real trees… we never have…and there were only so many places we could get a fake tree.
And EVERY ONE OF THEM would be packed. We would probably spend half an hour just finding a parking spot.
So I told the boys we would have to go buy another one… and to get dressed.
But Here was another problem.
Neither of our cars would fit the Christmas tree without folding down a back seat. And since the kids have to ride back there, that meant if we all went, we would have to take TWO vehicles.
And then we would have to navigate the craziness to find parking for BOTH our vehicles and Lord knows how close together they would be…
We decided to just find a hardware store. They wouldn’t be that busy…. right?
And They sell Christmas trees too, right?
😳
So we made it too the store. Both of us.
Parking was “okay.” I have no idea where Mama actually parked.
I unloaded both the boys and took them by the hands through the parking lot. They were pulling me ahead into the store like two huge great danes dragging me behind.
We finally made it in where we were greeted by…
…FREAKING SANTA CLAUS.
And all his little “helpers” were like, “oh you HAVE to come take pictures with Santa!”
My oldest was like, “SAANNNNNTAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!”
My youngest was like “Noooooo! CHRISSTMAS TREEEEEEEEE!!!!”
So older boy wanted to get a picture with Santa. Younger boy did not want ANYONE distracted from getting a Christmas Tree.
Meltdowns could be immanent with either decision.
So I was like “Alright Santa. Here’s what we’re gonna do. Bring it in guys.”
“Here. Santa’s helper? Take Mamas phone. Take a quick family shot. And I mean QUICK.”
“All right. Everyone smile. Jonah are you smiling? Whatever.”
click
Off we went to find the trees.
There happened to be a Black Friday sale on Christmas trees and we found a steal of a deal for like $135 marked down from about $320.
Score!
The kids were so excited. Success!!
So I carried that sucker in a 50lbs box all the way to the front of the store (yes I know. We didn’t think to get a cart)
When we went to ring it up, it came up at like $289.
😡
“No.” I said. “The display tree next to this box said it was on sale for $135.”
(I may be fudging these figures a bit because I don’t even remember what they were now)
“Yeah. This isn’t the same tree. Sorry.”
🤬🤬🤬🤬🤯🤯🤯🤯
So I was faced with a choice if either paying (like) $154 more than I wanted on this tree, or risk a DOUBLE-meltdown in the store right then and there if we had to go back to get a different one.
Yeah. I just told her to ring it up.
So I lugged that sucker back home and we opened it.
They were right.
It WASN’T the same tree. It has those annoying LED lights my wife hates. (At least you can change them though?)
So thanks to my awesome redirection skills that morning, we went out to the store on the busiest shopping day of the year and paid a small fortune for a Christmas tree we didn’t actually want just to keep the kids from having a meltdown about a stupid puzzle.
And now the stupid cats are trying to kill this tree too.
#bahHumbug