Preparing

We leave tomorrow to go and see Nora's Nana and Grampa in Alexandria. Nora loves airplanes - and of course she loves Nana and "yampa" too - so it is sure to be another tiring and exciting day for all of us. We get to have a whole other Christmas. And Nora gets to wear her whole Christmas outfit again! She now knows how to say that it is a "pity dess nana made it."

Traveling with a toddler takes so much preparation. Ken has multiple lists going to make sure we don't forget anything. I even packed Nora her own backpack this time. We have a new sticker book and some of her new Christmas books, her baby and many many cheerios. And of course a change of clothes ready to go (for me too!).

I've had nightmares about being "that mom" with "that kid," the one screaming and suddenly asked to leave the plane. I hope Nora's usual sunny disposition prevails. It could be a long flight...

More on Christmas

Now that I've caught caught up a bit more on sleep I can better reflect on our Christmas.

Christmas Eve morning began with a trip to the mall to see Santa. Mimi and Papa accompanied us. The mall is close and their Santa is actually pretty good. A friend gave me the tip last year that if you go to the mall first thing on Christmas Eve the lines are much more reasonable. That has been true for two years in a row now. As I drove to the mall I pondered the whole Santa experience, which is still clearly more for me than for Nora. While last year I could put her on his lap and think it was cute and funny that she was crying, this year it felt much more mean. I guess that's because now I know she understands things and can communicate her hurt to me. So we asked Santa to stand behind us and Mimi and I sat with Nora on Santa's chair. It was much more pleasant.

Christmas Eve dinner Ken cooked pinwheel steaks, sweet potato fries and salad. It was low key and easy (especially for me since I didn't even help. I had Christmas Hand, Foot and Mouth disease - Nora's own special present for me).

Really Nora's Christmas was defined by three gifts. The first, lucky for us, was her table. She has spent considerable time already sitting and coloring there. She knows it is her table - saying "MY table" pretty often, and sitting with her knees tucked under as she concentrates on coloring whatever picture she is currently creating.

The second gift was the tent - the igloo - that Mimi and Papa gave her. She was a bit hesitant at first, but once she got in she loved it. If Nora was missing, she was in her igloo. She ate, played and read in her igloo all evening. And she convinced everyone to get in with her at some point.

And the real winner was the cheerio book from Betty - "Betty Dallas" as Nora calls her. The book asked the reader to fill in certain pictures with cheerios. Nora liked that idea, and she liked the idea to eat the cheerios a whole lot more. She ate her weight in cheerios and more. She would "read" the book and eat the cheerios at the same time. Over and over and over again. She wouldn't eat any dinner.

Christmas has never been my favorite holiday - I'm not a scrooge, but I'm not Fezziwig either. But watching Nora and seeing how much she makes everyone around her smile and laugh may make more of a "believer" out of me after all.

Christmas

All I can really say is that I am exhausted. Which must mean Nora had a fantastic 2nd Christmas. Thanks Mimi, Papa, Unlce Andrew and Glenda (Nora's biggest fan) for spending a great day with us.

It is 8 o'clock and I think I'm off to bed.

Personal Day

Nora slept until 7:15 today. I can write that because I am sure it was a fluke and will never happen again even if I do put it out to the universe. But it was amazing. Amazing. A great beginning to my day dedicated to me.

I had planned a few weeks ago to take a "personal day" today - on my first day of my two week school break. I had determined that I would put all my mom guilt about daycare aside for a day and just think about me. I would send her to daycare and I would stay home. Alone.

Ever since I started sending Nora to daycare last year I have had this horrible nagging guilty feeling from the second the bell rings at the end of school to the time 10 minutes later when I pull into the church parking lot to pick Nora up. If I am not in school I should be with her. Now. Even being 2 minutes later than normal makes my heart race. It is irrational, I know, but I can't stop it.

Or, I couldn't stop it. Sometime in the last three weeks, as Nora's health returned to normal, I realized that I was tired. That I hadn't really had a guilt-free gone-from-Nora moment in two years. That I needed to kick that awful guilty feeling to the curb and relax on the couch. Take a day for me.

I prepared myself for this for a while. I confessed to Miss Laura this morning when I dropped her off that I was taking time for myself. I felt that guilt rise up. But I kissed Nora goodbye and went out the door to begin my day for me.

I had pictured myself reading a whole book wrapped in the covers of my bed. Or watching trash TV on the couch all day. Or napping all day long to catch up for two years of sleep deprivation. I warned Ken that I was not to be bothered about chores on my day to myself. He complied.

None of my super-relaxing scenarios turned into reality. I didn't have a book to read. Trash TV got boring really fast. And I did nap, but after sleeping to 7 am today I didn't feel as wiped as I sometimes do. I left daycare, went to the post office to mail my Christmas cards, came home and did the dishes, watched some Ellen, surfed the Internet. Ken and I went to Ikea to get Nora's Christmas gift. And then I did nap for an hour or so after we got home. Then I went to get Nora. And we went to the park.

I did enjoy being in the house without Nora around for a bit. But it got quiet. And all the little reminders of her - including the ornaments she hung on all the knobs around the house before she left this morning - made me miss her at the same time I was relishing my silence. The nagging guilt left me alone today, as I had hoped it would. And now, after taking time for me, I am more than ready to spend my two weeks with little "me" time and lots of "us" time.

Jingle Bells

Nora is in love with the Christmas tree. Upon waking in the morning, she has changed from her usual routine of stopping at the fridge for milk to walking to the tree and turning the lights on. She says "bye bye sismas tee" when we leave the house and she turns the lights off and says goodnight before she goes to bed. She has fallen in love with some of the ornaments as well. The pink sequin star and two "jingle" bells no longer reside on the tree, but in her Santa purse. And each day last week when we got home she would take some ornaments from the tree, put them around her wrists and walk around the house as if she were a Christmas tree herself.

I can already picture the tantrum that will occur when the tree must depart.

Toddler Crush

Today at the Christmas party at daycare, I met the mom of the boy who took his shirt off for Nora at daycare a few weeks ago. The one who she walked into a table for instead of letting go of his hand. The mom told me that he loves Nora so much. That when she talks about school in the morning, he just talks about Nora. That when he sings his ABCs he sings, "A, B, C, Nora, Nora, D..."

He might be the craziest one in daycare in terms of his enegry. But he must be the smartest one in terms of his taste in girls.

Presents, Hairbows and Helping

I'm afraid of presents. Last year, I was excited to get Nora a Christmas gift and a birthday gift. I hid them both in plain sight and she never noticed. She wasn't quite one yet.

This year is different. Nora knows somehow what a present is. She knows how to spot things I'm hiding from a mile away. She knows who Santa is (she said "Santa. Ho, Ho, Ho" to the bearded butcher in Central Market tonight. He wasn't so thrilled). She has already gotten a few presents for Christmas and her birthday, which are woefully close together. Last night, after she opened two gifts she asked for more. That's when I got scared. I think maybe I should just call off her birthday until she knows better. Too many presents. Too overwhelming. Too much stuff. Ugh.

But enough about presents - on to hairbows. I have been agonizing about Nora's hair for a month now. Do I cut it? Should she have bangs? Does it look too much like a mullet? And for all my thinking about it, nothing has happened. She still has wispy wavy hair that goes into her face too often. But she is so close to not having bangs, to being able to tuck it behind her ear. She refuses to wear anything in her hair. She likes to say "hairbow" but that is about it. But somehow, Miss Laura conned her into wearing a Pebbles-looking hairstyle today for her Christmas party. And when we got home I somehow conned her into a ponytail. And when I looked at her with the hairbow in - especially the ponytail - I couldn't deny it anymore. My baby is a little girl. She looked so big and grown up with her hair all "done." Maybe that is why I haven't cut her hair. Maybe I am already - at 23 months - trying to keep Nora as my little baby.

And helping. Nora is such a helper. She loads the dishwasher, turns on her nebulizer, brings her dishes to the sink. She cleans her books and shelves with diaper wipes, puts her coat away, turns the Christmas Tree lights on and off. And the other night she even helped Uncle Andrew with his laundry. He was so patient as she took each piece out of the dryer and put it in his basket. Then he handed her each piece from the washer and she put it enthusiastically in the dryer. She loves to help. And most times, when she's done, she'll look at me and say, "Yeah, Nora!"

My little growing helper will get lots of love, attention and presents this Christmas and birthday season. And my best present will be to have time away from work to spend with her.

Hot Fire

Ken should really be writing this. But he won't.

Before bed most nights Nora and Ken read Goodnight Moon. For those of you who know the book well, you can picture the green room with the fireplace in the background. Nora has apparently taken to this fire and wished the author had included it in the list of inanimate objects that the bunny says goodnight to before bed.

Nora, as Ken reports, sucks her thumb like Maggie from the Simpsons sucks her pacifier, as he reads, but each time he turns the page she removes the thumb long enough to point and say, "hot fire!" Then she replaces her thumb and waits for the fire to reappear on the next page so she can repeat her pointing and stating "hot fire!"

Tonight Nora was asking for me to put her to sleep (which I don't do because it takes 40 minutes) and she was crying after I left her with Ken in the rocker. He started reading Goodnight Moon and she kept crying. That is, until he pointed to the hot fire. She repeated and pointed. And apparently at the end of the book she said, "night night hot fire."

Too funny.

Nora's First Christmas Tree

With each ornament I took out of the box, Nora oohed and aaahed. To the white and silver heart, she said "mine" and laid it on her chest just where her heart is. To the giant silver snowflake ornament, she said, "so pretty!" And when I took out the star ornaments she started singing "Twinkle Twinkle." (We recently realized she knows the words to most of her songs - and sings along when she doesn't want to nap...)

Nora loved putting every ornament on the tree. And they when we were done she wanted to take them all off and do it again. She took the ones off the bottom two or three times and redecorated. Each time she successfully replaced an ornament she said, "Yeah, Nora!" and clapped for herself.

She even said "night night, Christmas tree," as we went off for bedtime.

Her nose is running - maybe a cold, maybe an allergy, maybe molars - but she is happy as can be.

It was the most fun I've had decorating a Christmas tree.