christmas, part 3

3:05 PM: I remembered Wesley had hidden a Christmas present for me under his bed. I asked him to go get it. As he retrieves it, I'm reflecting on this year's ornament casualties:

1. My Ocean City sand ornament. Somehow Laurel launched the ornament off the tree and it broke. Sand was all over the carpet and bookshelf. I rescued all of the little shells, tiny plastic pail, etc., and put them in a container. My mom said she'd mail me a handful of sand from the actual beach (not a China factory, so that probably improves on the original!) and I'll put letters on a fillable shatterproof ornament and fashion a nice replacement. My sad remnants....

2. My friend Michelle made me two matching ornaments several years ago, I believe she put paint on the inside of them and swirled them around. They're lovely. This year at one point I saw some debris on the floor and thought, 'hey, that looks like one of those ornaments?' and then I found one of the ornaments on the tree, half gone. So sad. Chucked the ornament. Luckily I still have one! The kids, um, have had a tendency to like, whack the tree like it's a t-ball stand. Not sure where they got the idea from, but it's happened a lot. We have a LOT of pine needles on the floor from this activity, as well as broken ornaments obviously.

3. Wesley brought home a "gift" for mom on the Tuesday before school was out. He insisted on opening it and would not claim it was a "gift" for me. It was an adorable handmade ornament with little snowmen on his handprint. It was made of glass and the teacher told him how fragile it was. We passed it back and forth in the kitchen just one time and promptly it was dropped. I handed it to him and probably let go a second too early before he had hold of it. It fell to floor, shattered in a zillion pieces, and he and I looked each other and both burst into tears. We were both equally to blame and we were both equally devastated. Luckily, I emailed the teacher and asked for the instructions to make a new one, and she said if I provided an ornament she'd have him make another in class. I scurried around that night and got a second fillable shatterproof ornament and sent it with him to school. This is great, because he made it Wednesday and then was home sick Thursday and Friday. I lucked out. (I'm volunteering to stock her supply with shatterproof ornaments for her families next year!) 

I opened the new ornament from Wesley. Just as lovely and just as precious as its deceased predecessor.

3:17 PM: Almost done with "dinner."