A Belated Christmas Eve

The kids get home tonight, they left two weeks ago on the last day of school. Since they left on a school day we didn’t have a chance to celebrate Christmas. Plus, I wanted to avoid the trauma of having them opening their presents only to get on a plane and leave all the goodies behind. It wasn’t’ to be mean, but when they take new things to their father’s, they become lost or destroyed. Plus the added bonus of him freaking that I bought them stuff. It’s hard to complain that I don’t spend the support money on the kids when they keep showing up with new things.

So the kids flew out on Friday at noon and a few hours later we boarded a plane for Las Vegas. We stayed 4 nights and flew home Christmas Day. It was planned on purpose so that it wouldn’t seem like we were missing out on Christmas. It was the first time the kids weren’t with me on Christmas morning. Back in Canada the houses are only 10 minutes apart so that no one has to miss out on special days.

While we tried to stay busy, we both still missed the kids. The Boy, who is 12 and avoids the mushy stuff, kept saying he missed us – this is new. The Girl just turns into an unfeeling robot and then we deal with the melt down a few days after her return.

The good things:

1. My Christmas shopping was done after Christmas – hit the sales, no crowds, no stress of finding the hard to get toys in time for Christmas. Yes they are getting an elusive Wii.

2. I didn’t have to stash presents all over the house and then try to find them at the last minute only to have a few turn up in February when I get around to picking the clothes up in my closet. Everything was piled up in the family room so I could compare sizes and amounts to make sure everything was even.

3. The Christmas tree didn’t displace everything else it the house. We put it up on the 2 Jan and it will be down on the 6th. Of course most of the decorations are sitting in the basement in Canada – I had set the container aside to come with us but the movers must have missed it. New decorations, but they were 75% off.

4. I wasn’t up half the night on Christmas Eve wrapping presents that will be unwrapped. I spent a nice relaxing afternoon in front of the TV wrapping presents. I even color coded the gifts. I just wish I had thought to buy paper that matched our silver and blue decorated tree.

The kids plane lands at 9:15PM. They will be the last ones off, then get the luggage and get home around 11PM. Just have to stuff the stockings and I can get a good nights sleep on our Christmas Eve for the first time. Since we have no extended family or close friends nearby we can get away with this. I think I would have been crushed if I had to do our regular celebrations without the kids.