Well I finally got all the Christmas decorations packed up and put away. No, I am NOT one of those who think it is acceptable to leave the decorations until, like, Valentines Day. You know the people that I'm talking about though; the ones whose house you drive by at July 4th and they still have that damn wreath hanging on the front and the lights still attached to the gutter.
What's that term we like to call them? Uh, uh, trailer something?
I went on a little trip (that post coming soon), over the New Year's to my biological family's house and told my other half to just leave the decorations alone until I got back since I have a few self made OCD issues with the way they are packed.
Does he listen? Oh hell no! It's another classic male chromosomal moment folks! Where they suddenly go deaf as they put the empty milk carton back into the fridge that you've told them three times already to throw away!
While I'm at the biological family's house, I'm having a convo on the phone with him about what he's been up to while his own DNA has been out of town.
"I cleaned the house!", he says with pride over the cell phone waves.
"What do you mean you cleaned the house?", I reply with a massive boom of suspicion in my voice.
"Well, I put up ALL the Christmas decorations and cleaned the house!", he says with more enthusiasm than a boy who has proudly proclaimed he just stuck a frog down his sisters pants would.
"What do you mean you put up the Christmas decorations!", I reply with a same amount of panic that the boys sister would once the frog slid down the leg of her pants.
"I took them all down and carefully packed them away. It's ALL done!", he says as beaming sunshine radiates out of my cell phone at the same time.
"Are you sure they're all packed safely in their original boxes; and where did you put all the ornaments?", voice shaking in the process.
"Yep, sure are, and the ornaments are all put away as well in the box.", he chirps one more time
"Where is the tree?"
"I took it outside to be picked up."
"Where is the tree stand?", I continue to interrogate him.
"It's still on the tree.", he slowly replies
"Well you need to take it off before someone takes the tree with the stand still on it.... don't you?", I say half yelling at him as the kids start to look up at me with a degree of "uh, oh", in their eyes knowing that mommy's head is about to fly off at any moment in front of their eyes.
"Uh, yeah, uh.... I forgot about that. But I'll take care of it!", he reassures me.
Why, oh why, do I feel a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach. See, the hubs idea of cleaning is literally sweeping the slate clean! Not putting it away, but sweeping into some portion of the house, or storage box, that is not currently being cluttered with other stuff he has previously swept there before.
He has ADOD - Attention Deficit in the Organization Department!
But I'm gonna give him the benefit of the doubt because that is what I'm suppose to do..... right? No! So I'm not, and with good reason.
So I finally got home a week later only to walk in the house to see half the decorations still out and some still hanging in their original spots.
WHAT exactly did he put up?
The tree is sitting in the middle of the front door walk way with the stand still attached, but sans ornaments at least. Did he think that the stand would magically take itself off and roll itself into the garage with the rest of the ornament boxes.
Then I notice the Advent calendar still on top of the armoire where I had to rescue it from the the midget who was determined to play with Santa as he turned around when each calendar door was opened, completely freaking me out each time she did it.
Did I mention I have OCD at this time of year?
WHERE exactly did he put everything?
BTW, the house does not look as if it has been cleaned. Unless you consider the kitchen sink free of dirty dishes "a house cleaned".
I purposely ignored it for the past week as I got the kids all use to going back to school and resuming something that resembles responsibility in the homework department, but today I decided to drag out all the Christmas storage boxes and try not to give myself a heart attack figuring how and what he did.
Well THAT didn't work because I was laid out on the kitchen floor in front of my kids and my daughter's friend, who spent the night last night, literally having a grand maul heart attack in front of all of them after I opened the five storage crates.
Stuff I have collected since I was 18 was "stuffed" and "crammed" in every possible position without any of their protective boxes or coverings. Ornaments, which are normally wrapped individually (OCD style), were instead, crammed in completely disarray in a box and stacked in the garage among some other storage boxes that had nothing to do with Christmas.
Here comes the stroke!
And will someone please explain to me why my antique manger scene had half the heads snapped off! The manger itself is going to need some major repair as it is half fallen apart!
Here comes the part where my eyes, ears, and nose start bleeding profusely from the blood vessels exploding in my head!
WHAT did he do!!
Needless to say, I had to take everything out of the boxes and repack everything all over again. In the process, all these things that I have carefully taken care of all these years in hopes of handing them down to my kids like any other hoarding, over nostalgic mother, look like they had been handled by, well, my kids!
I found a few of my Christmas village scenes broken, the Nutcrackers mouth no longer stays shut thus making him look like he's in constant begging mode like the cat.
What he said took him 2 days.... 2 days, to do took me only two hours to unpack, repack, and store in the holiday corner of our garage. It would have taken only an hour except I had to have a few major temper tantrums, crying fits, and several rounds of expletives in the privacy of my own closet before the process was through.
My daughters friend gave me lot's of sympathy and even tried to help, but I know THAT she knows that I'm the official crazy birth mother of her best friend. Toni was the only one who got a clue and decided the best course of action was to hide in her room until the whole episode was over.
There is nothing like having a minor nervous breakdown in front of your kids friends. It makes lasting memories for them when they get older that they will truly kick your ass for, after years of being in therapy.
So between the ornamental pandemonium,
my cats,
my self-made obsessive behavior,
the sperm donor completely screwing a bank account,
and indolently successfully completed my New Year's resolutions
I have made it almost half way through the first month of the New Year without shaving my head bald!
It's shaping up to be a damn fine year!
