December? Was that a month?

Hi.  I mean, hello, strangers, to whom I have not written in many moons.

It's been a little crazy here. I go back to school on Monday (with little hope for a delay or cancellation due to snow, since it's just a teacher day. Boo.) and I'm supposed to begin teaching Macbeth, and well...how about a movie, kids?

So, here's a quick wrap-up of our holiday season:

Wednesday, Dec 18: Nora and I make cookies in preparation for a cookie exchange party (the best kind of party, naturally).  She takes a nap, and wakes coughing...and coughing and coughing. And feverish.  Skip party, watch Elmo instead.  You'll notice Elmo becomes a theme.

Somewhere in the wee hours between Dec 18 and 19: up all night. Lots of coughing.

Thursday, Dec. 19: First day of final exams at school. I take the morning off so I can take Nora to the doctor and hope my sub doesn't listen when my students tell him I said that they can use their notes on the final AND they should work in groups that include their best friend.  Doctor says it's just a cold but call back if it gets worse or it's not improving by Monday.  Okay...I can handle this.

False. Get a flat tire on the way home. I don't mean a slowly leaking tire - a FLAT TIRE. For some ridiculous reason, I believe I can make it to the Firestone Tires near our house. By the grace of God and NOTHING ELSE - I mean it, the tire was flaaaaaaaaat - I make it there.  The woman working the counter takes one look at me and immediately assumes (correctly) that I am crazy.  I tell her with tears in my eyes that we were on the way home from the pediatrician because Nora is sick, and I might need to leave the car and have someone come get me, because Nora is hungry and it's lunchtime, and she says: "We'll take care of it."  God bless that lady.  It was fixed in a half hour, and miraculously, nothing else was broken.  She probably told the men working that I was a crazy lady and they should get me out of there as quickly as possible, but I don't care.  Nora got a sucker from a grandmotherly stranger, who I shouldn't have trusted but did anyway, and she didn't even die from it. It was just a regular, drug-free sucker.  Nora loved it so much she didn't want to eat lunch.

In the afternoon, I have to take Nora with me to school, so I can run finals through the scantron and write sub plans for the next day, just in case.  She watches Elmo on the projector screen and eats blueberries and takes all of the SSR books off the shelf.   And poops, majorly.

So, this is what you do every morning? Blueberries, coloring, and Elmo?

Friday, Dec. 20: Second day of final exams at school.  Nora sleeps decently (albeit in the guest room with Ryan) so I go to school, give the last final, and then frantically grade it, finalize grades, and wrap things up so I can pick up Nora from the babysitter.  After my students were done with their finals, I let them hang out and watch dumb YouTube videos (only after I made them watch this one: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zIEIvi2MuEk  ). A boy laid down on the floor, and I said: "I changed a poopy diaper on that floor last night."  He did not lay on the floor anymore.

We were supposed to leave Friday night for Ryan's parents in Illinois, but I was holding off on packing because I didn't believe we would ever actually, successfully leave the house. So Friday afternoon I packed frantically and finished wrapping the presents needed for that weekend before Ryan got home from work, and we somehow managed to leave by 7something. There was some Elmo watching.  Then some Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer in the car, but minus the parts with the Abominable Snowman, because Nora thinks he's scary. Can't say I blame her.

Saturday, Dec. 21: Hang out with family. I feel weird. We go to dinner. The sight of the food makes me ill, but some calculations tell me I'm not pregnant - I have the stomach flu.  6 of 10 kids are Nora's daycare (thankfully, not her) came down with it earlier that week; several of my students had it. Now it was my turn. Puked all night. Super fun.

Nora was recovering from her cold and somehow managed not to get the flu, so she fed her cousin Catelyn instead. You know, 'cause she's 25.

Sunday, Dec. 22: I cannot be held responsible for anything that happened this day. I believe we celebrated Christmas with Ryan's family. I ate saltines and took several naps and tried not to breathe on anyone. We came back home that night.

Monday, Dec. 23: I have not yet finished Christmas shopping or wrapping.  I need to go to the grocery store. Nora is still coughing but getting better.   I answer the phone when my mom calls, and she says I need to go to the doctor.  My ears and throat hurt so bad that I go to the clinic because I think surely I have an ear infection or strep throat or probably the Black Plague. I do not have any of those things, do not receive any wonderful drugs to heal me, and am upset at the dumb nurse who was not at all dumb for not making me have an ear infection or the Plague.  I do not make it to the grocery store. Or finish Christmas shopping.  Ryan feels equally terrible but stays up past 1 to assemble Nora's play kitchen from Santa.  You'd think Santa's elves could have done this, but apparently they had the flu, too.

Christmas Eve: I am dying and Ryan is dying and Nora wants to run in circles, as she is mostly feeling better but has passed her evil toddler germs to us.  Against my mother's advice, I go to the grocery store (so we don't starve on Christmas), run through the ATM, wrap more presents, and pull Nora & I together enough to go to church.  We are 15 minutes early but park in the grass, and find a standing room only when we get there. I look pathetic enough that some people scoot over to give me a seat.  They seem generous, so I eat 37 cough drops during Mass to try to spare them my germs.  On the way out, I see a friend and talk to him while walking out.  The greeter assumes he's my husband and gives him the free book that they're giving out, and I'm grateful because I don't have time to read anyway.  (Thanks for taking one for the team, Kyle.)  I come home and check on Ryan, who fell asleep as soon as he got home from work. He is still sleeping and doesn't wake until I tell him that dinner is ready.  We eat dinner, hang stockings, put cookies out for Santa, and get Nora to bed.  Then I get the food ready for Christmas morning, clean up (because I simply cannot have Christmas in a mess a ridiculous as the one my house has become), wrap the last couple of presents that I need for the next day, and we call it a night.

Stockings! (The 4th stocking is for Zadie. No big announcements here.)

Christmas Day: Quiet at last. We celebrate, but mostly take it easy. We all nap at least once and are feeling slightly like normal human beings and not snot-wads. I finish wrapping presents that night (nothing like waiting until the last minute).

Chef Nora.

26th: Feel slightly better.  Frantically pack again; leave for my parents.

27th: Celebrate Christmas with my side of the family.  Feeling a little better each day.

Nora says "no. no no no" when asked to take pictures, so this is actually a pretty amazing success.

Nora and Connor liked helping Papa Ray collect the wrapping paper.

28th; Ryan's birthday: Go to my grandparents' for lunch, where Nora eats a healthy lunch of applesauce...and three bowls of ice cream. (She hadn't been eating well since the cold that was still lingering.) We leave the kids with my parents and go to dinner with my sister and brother-in-law.

The 29th: Go home.  Want to cry upon sight of the disaster that has taken over my ENTIRE house. Start organizing instead.

The 30th: Clean. Grocery store. Clean some more.

New Year's Eve: Ryan's parents arrive, as they have blessedly offered to babysit on NYE. We get ready, leave instructions to call immediately if Nora starts puking (as my nieces and sister all had the stomach flu, now), and go to a swanky NYE party (or what I, a person who thinks it is amazing to eat dinner without someone throwing food on the floor, calls swanky), where every song reminds me of Nora in some way.  For example: The band played "Carry On," which was most popular when Nora was most colicky, so when I would drive in circles around town, I would listen to it over and over while she slept, finally, in the backseat. But we have tons of fun with friends we don't see to see as much as we'd like, and dance all night, and arrive home safely around 2:30am. 2014.

I'll stop there.

Snowpacolypse 2014: you've got nothin' on me.

Happy New Year, friends.