Lombard Christmas 101: How to Make A Short Story Really Long

Sorry for my week-long absence – as you can tell from the title this is kind of long so you might want to fix yourself a sandwich before settling down to read this.

In the 5 years that Jacques and I have been married we have never done much for Christmas and no, we aren’t Mr. Grinch and Mrs. Scrooge. For one reason or another we just never decorated the house, hung stockings, baked Christmas cookies or did much in the gift exchange department. Last year I was determined we would change that and go all out for the holidays since it was Jadon’s first Christmas. Well, we ended up celebrating Christmas in California so we figured there was no need to decorate the house. This year we decided to stay home and since it was Nathan’s first Christmas and Jadon’s first Christmas at home, I was more than determined go at this with gusto. I hadn’t worked out the finer details but sometime in September I started to envision this wonderful just-like-the-movies Christmas… yeah, I was living in a fantasy world.

I was due with our second child December 5 and since I was scheduling a c-section chances were good I would have him a few days before that. I temporarily forgot what the recovery from surgery would be like, let alone the side effects of sleepless nights. And I also forgot that I am not superwoman and scheduled my last day of work to be the Wednesday before Thanksgiving. Given my current state of denial about how fast the baby’s due date was approaching I had put off getting ready for the baby until the last minute. Needless to say those last few weeks in November were jam-packed with work and baby laundry so Christmas never entered my mind. I was excited about planning ‘the Lombard family Christmas traditions’ but by the time I really put some thought into it I had run out of time. I couldn’t drive for 2 weeks after the c-section but that was kind of a moot point since I physically didn’t feel like going anywhere for those first 2 weeks anyway. I wasn’t brave enough to venture out on my own with the two boys when I finally felt like getting out of the house (2 weeks to go until Christmas) so I had to wait for Jacques to get home from work or for my mom to come around and baby-sit. I didn’t want to torture Jacques and have him come with me – I dislike shopping and unless I know exactly what I want I take forever and a day to make up my mind. When we moved into our apartment in California he spent 40 minutes with me at Target waiting for me to make up my mind about shower curtains!

My mom and dad were great – they decided not decorate their house for Christmas so they offered me all their decorations. I really wanted a fresh tree but that wasn’t going to happen at the rate I was moving so I borrowed their artificial tree, nativity scene, outdoor lights and other various decorations which saved a lot of shopping time. I did venture out to get some ornaments, table decorations other things so overall I think the living room and dining room came out looking pretty nice. Since Jadon is into everything we only decorated the tree from his height up which looked kind of weird, but what can I say? I am the mom of a toddler. I bought Jadon his own small tree and threw on some colored lights and plastic ornaments... which came off the tree as soon as he got his hands on them but I didn’t mind too much since that was his tree to play with and it kept his hands off of our tree (for the most part). However, he still liked to play with his animal figures on the lower branches of the tree in the living room. Even if the house wasn’t going to come together just as I had hoped I was still going to bake Christmas cookies. What I didn’t get done in the house I more than made up for in the Christmas cookie department. I spent three days in a marathon baking session, which not only resulted in 10 different cookies and candies but also started my love affair with the food processor – I can’t wait to make cookies next year!

My parents decided at the last minute to head to California to spend Christmas with my brother and his wife. I was in the midst of a week long post-partum depression when I found out and that did quite a number on me, but if any of you are holding your breath to see if I survived you can breathe a sigh of relief. My parents came over the Sunday before Christmas to have their Christmas with us and give Jadon his gifts. Since I was up to my eyelashes in flour and chocolate from my baking marathon we decided to have a simple dinner. We made chicken parmesan – talk about a traditional Christmas dinner, but moving on… my parents brought over their gifts and my mom asked Jadon to put his presents under the tree. The little tyke had no idea what was going on and put them under the tree after he made sure to take off the bows. My parents and Jacques and I went in on Jadon’s big gift together, which was a rocking horse. My parents had assembled it and brought it with them. There was no way we were going to go through 15 rolls of wrapping paper trying to figure out how to wrap that sucker up to get it under the tree so Jacques and my dad had put it in the garage (though I didn’t know where it was at the time). While eating dinner my mom mentioned that if Jadon knew what presents were and what was about to happen after dinner he wouldn’t remain in his seat eating dinner like it was just another day. Upon that comment I asked where the horse was to which she replied it was in the garage. Apparently my little boy is smarter than I give him credit since he looked up from his dinner, climbed out of his booster seat and ran over to the garage door saying “horse, horse”. He kept running back to us and then the garage door trying to get us over the garage. Thus ended dinner and we pulled out his present from the garage to begin the gift fest.

I had every intention of doing something traditional for Christmas Eve and Christmas day but that was all it was – intentions. Our church has a Christmas Eve service but there is no childcare. Nathan wouldn’t be a problem but trying keep Jadon in his seat for an hour is just… well, I would rather get my eyebrows waxed and I hate pain. Jacques worked until almost 6:00 pm on Christmas Eve and I had yet to come up with any Lombard Christmas Eve meal or traditions so it was kind of a bust. I made a meatloaf dinner, cleaned the house, wrapped gifts and watched The Man Who Knew Too Little. ‘Going down a rabbit trail’ as my pastor is fond of saying, if you haven’t seen The Man Who Knew Too Little you have to watch it! I have seen it many times and each time it cracks me up. The movie is a funny, difficult to describe spy adventure where everyone knows just how deadly the stakes are except for Bill Murray's character. He mistakenly thinks everything that is happening around him is a type of performance art instead of real life. You can’t guess what is going to happen next and from the title sequence to the end you have to pay attention or you might miss something. Christmas was pretty laid back. We opened gifts, ate breakfast and Jadon played with toys while Jacques and I took naps (not at the same time lest you think we let the kids roam around unsupervised). By the end of the day Jacques wasn’t feeling well (I think he ate too much candy) so I made a turkey dinner and watched the boys while he slept it off.

So while it wasn’t the Christmas I had dreamed it would be, we were together as a family, the house was decorated and most importantly, we had Christmas cookies. I can’t wait for next Christmas!