fun days

My Christmas vacation starts tomorrow. I originally was going to work tomorrow, but I thought "ah screw it". If we get the snow they say we are getting, then I'm going to take Ellie and Jack out to play. We'll put all our winter gear on and head out. Jack will be really, really surprised. I am so excited to have the next 13 days off with my favorites. Not that I don't always love and appreciate my kids, but when tragic, devastating things happen in the world, it always puts life into perspective and makes me realize that little things just aren't worth getting upset about. Cherish every moment, whether it's stressful, annoying, or just plain hard. There might be a lot of these things going on with a 1 year old and a 3 year old because they are just learning and growing. I'm learning to let them get away with a few things, because "really does it matter?"

Some of these examples include:

• dumping a bucket of water on Mama's back when she's sitting next to them in the tub
• Jack chewing on his toothbrush until it's bloody (some molars are coming in)
• Ellie changing her clothes 3 or 4 times a day
• Ellie getting skid marks in her undies :(
• Ellie eating cookies and junk food for a week at school (because it's Christmas)
• Jack playing with the toilet plungers (2 of them at a time)
• Jack playing with the toilet bowl cleaner and sometimes putting it in his mouth (at least it's not the part that goes directly in the toilet and it's just the stick, since I have the throw away sponge kind)
• Both of them wanting another serving (3) of yogurt with cereal and then not eating it.
• Letting both of them eat yogurt after their baths and brushing their teeth.
• Ellie completely destroying my closet upstairs which holds every kind of hello kitty sticker, bag, wrapping paper, stationary, envelopes, thank you cards and anything cute. (she took all of my neatly organized drawers and dumped them out and then I think danced on all of it - that is what I pictured in my head. It was even too much of a disaster to take a picture of).