Dear Son #1, #2, & #3,
Happy New Year boys! I hope you enjoyed your break from school, the fun activities, the family time, the copious amount of unsupervised sugar consumption and, of course, the lovely presents that this time of year has to offer. With the exception of me and Daddy getting the flu that you all had earlier on in the month (thank you for sharing, we really enjoyed that) we also had a good time.
As I perused other friends’ Christmases on the dangerous rabbit hole that is social media, I began to wonder what my holidays would have looked like if I had girls. Would it be slightly less physically exhausting? Maybe more mentally? Would it be filled with dolls and art supplies rather than Lego and dinosaurs? I’ll never know, but one thing I do know, this has been one of the most snot-filled, board-breaking, snow-stormy, super-shirtless, messy-cookie-making, music-making, chilly-skating, insane-sledding, magically-lit, Marvel-boxing, volcano-erupting, library-terrorizing Christmas I’ve ever experienced.
We had the flu like no other leading up to Christmas, filled with fevers, headaches, walk-in clinics, Tylenol, and a lot of snot. Man Flu is something on a whole other realm and something that us womenfolk simply don’t experience nor understand. It’s debilitating, painful, and requires a lot of verbal accompaniments. Multiply that by four and Mommy almost went to spend Christmas with Santa at the North Pole.
Five days before Christmas—with only Mommy working her way through the Man Flu— the two of us got our Blue belts at Taekwondo. We broke boards with our feet and elbows, threw each other down on mats, and kicked until we couldn’t lift our legs anymore. Now we are three belts away from black and things are starting to get real. If you can’t beat ’em, join ’em.
Before fall was even out the door on December 21, snow storm upon snow storm hit us relentlessly. To a point that on the second snow day in school, I didn’t drive you to school. First time ever. Not proud of it. But it made for some fun snow forts, well-dressed snowmen, and, uh, shirtless-snow-superheroes. Boys are weird.
Maybe cookie-making is the same for both genders but I feel like I was cleaning up for weeks after you guys decorated sugar cookies for Christmas. Sprinkles in every crevice and icing sticking to the counter like cement; the memories were made, the magic was had, the vacuum was used. And as for the gingerbread Millennium Falcon? May the force be with me.
This Christmas was unusually musical for us—considering I am not musical whatsoever. However, you boys participated in the Christmas concert at school and I was quite impressed with the talent I didn’t know you all had. Shortly after, without any consultation, Daddy bought you boys a drum set for Christmas. A Real. Life. Drum. Set. Obviously I’ll deal with him later but in the meantime I’m reeeeaaally glad it came with headphones as we’re really digging into our inner Animal from the Muppets.
Last winter we took you boys skating for the first time, it was a struggle but by the end of the season I felt you really started to get the hang of it. Then, of course, summer came and we didn’t skate for half a year so we started again just before the holidays. It was a bit painful, both figuratively and literally but we all muscled through and I’m happy to report that you can officially skate more than 20 seconds without falling on your butts. On the subject of injuries, as you know, Pop built an epic snow hill for sledding during our visit over the holidays. And it was fast. I made you wear helmets for obvious reasons and my back hurt just watching you. I still don’t know how no bones were broken, it was a Christmas miracle.
As per the last three years, we’ve had a tradition before Christmas to go see the Magic of Lights at Springwater Park. So we picked a night where we were sort-of in between Man Flus and enjoyed the beauty of Christmas lights at every turn. Thankfully 90% of the lights we could see from the safety of our vehicle as when you were let out to walk around the little village it was like three very loud pinballs being sprung loose.
Christmas Day was full of energy, on your part. While I was just fresh out of the fever stage of the flu and Daddy was right behind me, energy was more at a premium for us. Thankfully you got some pretty cool gifts to keep you occupied with favourites including over-sized superhero punching gloves (thanks thrift store!) and a massive paper mache dinosaur land (thanks Pop!). Honestly, what better way to spend Christmas? Sometimes I would be okay with a Barrie doll or two. Might be quieter too.
As customary during any type of holiday from school, we will inhabit the local library wherever we happen to be. This year we stayed with Nanny and Pop so the Dwight Library got the pleasure of our company this year. We made it through a scavenger hunt, a photoshoot and four STEM stations (complete with, to my absolute horror, free range use of a bottle of baby oil and a bag of chocolate chip cookies) without too much disaster. Stealing a glance over at the little girls sitting quietly, I was relieved at this.
Aside from all of the snot, I had a great holiday boys, and hopefully you did too. And while I often wonder how different it would look with girls, I never, ever wish for them instead. Okay, well maybe when I’m cleaning your toilet, but other than that, never, ever.
Love Mommy,
XOX
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