Santa's Little Workshop of Horrors

YIKE! Christmas is only 4 days away !
Why did we go away one week before Christmas - are we nuts ?
We are also traveling to NY for New Years Eve at a friends . I haven't even unpacked yet ! Or sent Christmas cards out ! Or started my shopping!
That's all right for those of you who know me you know i am into the whole "Winter Solstice" vibe anyway - a whole season of celebration. So you will get your cards/gifts....eventually. ; )

Actually , my panic is a bit unecessary because last night we transformed our house into a veritable Santa's workshop and baked our brains out. My step daughter Zoe came over at 1:00 in the afternoon and we made gingerbread until it came out of our ears, literally.

Colin sat in his highchair and played while we rolled out dough , baked and decorated like pros. At one point he reached over and put both fists into a bowl of white icing and he ended up covered in a snowy white crust of sugar. I was still picking it out of his hair this morning ( and that was after a bath ). Clean-up was hell.
It looked like someone blew up the Keebler treehouse.

Zoe and her Dad went out and got the tree , strung the lights and beaded garland and brought in all the boxes of ornaments. The entire house is filled with tubs and boxes and bags again and i wonder if we will ever be without some maelstrom of disarray taking over our home.

It was like this before i moved in after W's renovation , then again with my relocation, the pregnancy and labor ( we at one point filled the hallway with a collapsible labor pool) and then baby's arrival with all of the necessary accoutrement - swings and buzz chairs and pack-n-plays. And laundry . Oh , don't get me started on the laundry.

Baskets and baskets of laundry seem to sprout up overnight. I have 4 baskets of CLEAN laundry waiting to be put away. Sigh. It is a futile task to feel 'finished' with housekeeping of any kind. No wonder Fifties housewife's had an overly enthusiastic attachment to martinis and 'mother's little helpers'. And we're not talking elves here !

I need a drink , dammit !
Nursing has it's downside. Tee-totaling is it .
But , the gingerbread is made, the tree is lit and there is always Amazon.com , thank JESUS. I guess we are supposed to scurry around like little mice around the holidays. It helps to burn off all of the cookie fat.

Happy Holidays everyone !!!

Paradise Lost & Found

Well , we have returned from St. Maarten , a little worse for the wear but we survived our first international travel with an infant. The weather was perfect , the trip to went surprisingly smoothly and we both are EXHAUSTED. Make that all three of us .
Buggles , to his credit , was THE perfect little traveler. You know that look you get from people as you are boarding the plane with a baby in tow and umpteen bags and blankies and toys, etc. Sort of a low grumble of dread falls over the plane and people start griping about 'earplugs' ? Well, anyone with kids knows that parents harbor the greatest amount of dread when it comes to babies and plane travel. My blood pressure must have been off the charts as i squeezed my way to our seats.
Blessings of all blessings - no one sat in our row on the second flight ( 4 hours) but little man was the bomb ! He was chirpy and happy while he was awake, playing with his toys and flirting with the nice lady who sat behind us and then after about an hour fell into oblivion and nursed and slept the entire last leg of the journey. He acclimated beautifully - not a peep of dissent as we wheeled him through airports, packed him into rental cars , introduced him to island culture and made our temporary home in the resort. He took it all in stride , a big beautific buddha smile on his face as he flitted to and fro.
He wasn't so wild about being slathered with a thick coat of sunscreen every morning but he just submitted to it like a monk , nonetheless.

Unfortunately our resort has become home to every octagenarian from middle America and now caters to those who require 'entertainment' ( read bad reggae covers by bands whose last gig was your cousin's bargain basement wedding) We escaped as much as we could to various beaches but had to camp there occasionally by the pool for the little Bug who is still wary of the Ocean ( as he should be) but LOVES the water.
We bought him a little yellow ring to float in and had a great time with him splashing and 'swimming' around. We , of course sipped Pina Coladas ( yes, mine was VIRGIN, sheesh) while cheering him on. Ahhh, the life of the leisure class...

Ha! I wish. Vacation with an infant is NO vacation, that's for sure. We got up at 7:00 every morning and followed HIS schedule - ending up in bed by seven at night ! No nightlife for his bedraggled , burnt-out parents- no way. We were too tired to go out on the town anyway!

The trip back was a little hairy as we got stuck on the tarmac in St. M and almost missed our connecting flight home. We literally pulled off a small miracle as we dashed through the North Carolina Intl. airport , through customs and to the gate where they told us the plane was already pulled away from the connecting ramp. Some blessed woman, called and cajoled the pilot to come back and re-connect so we could board. Talk about skin -of -your teeth luck ! Just ONE minute later and we would have missed our connection and be spending another night in a hotel ( without our luggage). As , it was our luggage arrived a day later than we did but who cares? We got home.

All in all the trip was an EXPERIENCE. We are now planning a trip for the two of us alone later next year, to recover. We did manage to get some incredible photos which i will share as soon as i download them to Flickr.

The great thing about capturing a vacation in photographs is that you look back years from now and only remember the good things about it- the proverbial rose-colored glasses syndrome.
And that is how we will remember this trip - because it was the first time we flew with Colin , the first time we took him to the Caribbean and the first time we went on vacation for someone other than ourselves. We built memories for our the new shoot of our family bamboo grove and when it all come down to it - what else really matters ?

It's good to be home.........