We stay home and do the following:
- Get the tree out (it's new because the dog broke our last one).
- Brave the Raiders of the Lost Ark warehouse that our garage has become in the vain hope we'll find all our Christmas decorations from last year
- Our hopes are usually dashed when we discover only 1/3 of them turn up
- For some reason, for the past few years, we never can seem to locate the extension cords and power strips we stored the previous year. They are always disappearing without a trace during the rest of the year, and we're forced to buy new ones when Christmas comes around.
- Dad and I have to buy new decorations, because many are missing from the tree (I cannot tell you how many lovely, unique Christmas tree ornaments we've "lost" due to all the moving and boxes being re-arranged in the past few decades).
- Mom yells at us for spending money "unnecessarily" on such things
- Any time we want to do more extensive decorations, we often have to do it without mom's help (or knowledge), because she either refuses to help due to being perpetually ill or weak, or screams at us for going in and doing it "without her consent," or wants to be lazy about decorating the house properly for the holiday.
- we hope for fudge and Christmas cookies and get none (or I'm forced to do it, and I get tired of baking cookies after being forced to baby-sit out in the kitchen for 10-12 batches).
- we wrap presents over the 4 weeks before Christmas
- Mom keeps changing how we do stuff out of the blue, like putting the Christmas village under the tree, so we have nowhere to put the presents
- we often have to watch Christmas movies without her, because she doesn't tolerate any she doesn't like (which is many)
- we can't play Christmas music she doesn't approve of, and in the past 10 years, all she wants to hear is Celtic Woman and the classics, never anything else that might be just as good
- relating to the above: those CDs disappeared due our family moving 4x in 6 years.
- Our ex-church holds Christmas concerts every year, and we've been able to participate in at least two, and watch all the rest, though after dumping that church (it's complicated) I don't feel comfortable about attending the concert this year, but we're going because that's what mom wants.
- Only highlight of Christmas is opening presents on Christmas Day and having some fun for a day or two.
(You starting to notice a theme here? I hate having a mother get old. It's no wonder people move out at 18 and later dump their parents in nursing homes: it keeps said parents from going to the grave early, if you know what I mean. I want to exchange her for the happier, healthier, younger version of herself and throw this mean, sick old changeling out).
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