'Twas a Happy Christmas Morning!

Day breaks. Feet skip and trip down the corridor. Excitement bubbles from five year old lips. "It's Christmas morning!" Stockings dumped out. Bubbles blown and floating. Soap is spilling. Nails polished. Saliva dissolving chocolate melting in mouth not on hands. Purses hung on shoulders shrugged. Squeals and laughter and gasps of air. "We're hungry!" Coffee brewed. Pancakes flipped into maple syrup dipped. Now paper tears and ornaments fall. Boxes thrown and ribbons mauled. Happy, happy, happy Christmas morn. Music. Jumping. Showing and shoving. Marking. Dumping. Sharing and hugging. Happy, happy, happy Christmas morn. Crying now. "She's pushing me!" To your room, NOW. Assembling large toys. Next year we'll do this ahead of time. Live and learn. "Can I come out now?" Clean up, clean up, everybody, everywhere. Time for lunch. Christmas Eve feast leftovers! Ah... what a happy Christmas morning.

Home in the Motherland

Yes. We are all home again. Sure it's been ages since a post... what can I say? November flew bye, which means it was crammed full of great stuff that we Mitchells busied ourselves with. Highlights: a birthday celebration; a best friend's engagement; lots of airplanes and trains and taxis and buses and boats, even an elephant; a trip to China; a trip to Texas; a trip to Malaysia; a trip to Thailand; lots of family face time; lots of turkey; lots of curry; girls' first bonafide sleep over (gasp!); a Christmas tree in our living room...

Today Mateja informed me that the Motherland is where Mothers can go. They only have to pay one dollar to get into the Motherland. And there are no other people in the Motherland other than mothers, of course. And the only things that are really in the Motherland are massages (do they have Thai massages?) and quiet time and peace. Oh and once you pay that one dollar to gain entrance, everything else is free.