Wow. I sure keep taking these long breaks from this here blog, don’t I? In six years of blogging (SIX YEARS?) I’ve never been as absent as the last few weeks. Do you know what this tells you? THAT THE HOLIDAYS ARE WINNING! It’s like some sort of cage match, first between me and Thanksgiving. I kinda finally took Thanksgiving down after a long and bloody battle, but then Thanksgiving cheated! And tag-teamed Christmas! WHAT THE HELL? That is NOT fair! Who has the energy to fight Christmas in the same match as Thanksgiving? NOT ME.

I made that trip to Louisiana with the kids at Thanksgiving which I wouldn’t have survived without MrZ’s brother and his wife. So, today I leave for Knoxville for a rush trip before Christmas and who’s the lucky bastard who gets to travel with me this time? LilZ. Because when a high school student finishes exams the first thing they want to do is get in the car with their Mom and two screaming siblings to drive for four hours. FUN! The awesome thing is? He’s actually acting like it’s not a big deal. Because LilZ learned a long time ago…Mommy does enough bitching for all of us. He doesn’t need to add to the mix.

This last-minute trip will be good for the soul becuase I’m meeting my brother and we’re going to do Dad Things. Things that either remind us of Dad or would make Dad happy. We planned this at the last minute as a way to try to force the Missing Dad Funk out of our system before the day of actual Christmas. We’re also going to meet up with a few people in Knoxville we’ve been neglecting since Dad died, but who were integral parts in our survival. It will be a good trip but one that took away THREE DAYS from my pre-Christmas prep. So, since touching the ground in Huntsville after out trip to Tucson? It’s been full on Christmas Attack Mode. Shopping, Wrapping, Decorating and Writing. I still have about 10 Christmas cards to mail because I ran out of stamps. Those people will get their cards AFTER Christmas…which will be better than not at all. Right? Of course, AndyZ threw a wrench in the whole Christmas Attack mode when he spent one whole night puking. But did I let that slow me down? NEVER!

(But please excuse any presents you may receive with faint traces of vomit on them. I was trying to multitask.)

(Kidding!)

(Those were all for my husband. He’s used to the smell.)

Thanks to my in-laws, NikkiZ still got to do her Gingerbread house. That was the first thing I took off the list when I realized we’d be short a few days. MrZ’s Sister took her to Wal-Mart Sunday to pick out the house and the two of them along with MrZ’s Mom decorated away. It turned out amazing. For my part, I managed to squeeze in a trip to the Galaxy of Lights last night because that’s one of my favorite traditions. We’ve seen several Santas, given out a bunch of presents, been to school parties AND work parties. All in all? I’m damn proud of what all I’ve accomplished. This cage match has been grueling, with three out-of-town trips around Thanksgiving and Christmas, a couple of illnesses, and copious amounts of eating that had to be done by me. (What? You don’t schedule your gorge fests?) All in all? Even with the unfair tag-team action by Thanksgiving? I think I’m going to walk away the winner in this match. The Holiday season is totally my bitch.

Another picture of us pre-party because we looked so cute!