Each and every holiday I attempt to have it be THE PERFECT day. Knowing that there is a better chance of me winning the lottery…and I don’t even play the lottery.
“Ahhh holidays. We see the pics on social media. Prefect moms. Perfect homes. Perfect kids. Perfect. ”
Each and every holiday I attempt to have it be THE PERFECT day. Knowing that there is a better chance of me winning the lottery…and I don’t even play the lottery.
I start each holiday morning the same. Before daylight and with the visions of perfection in my head, only to be sidetracked all day with other “mom like” tasks and side meals and fights and messes and … well you get the picture.
We eat at 2pm every holiday.
I don’t know why.
I don’t even remember the reason, but it has stuck.
6 of the 7 kids were in for Easter. 2 of the 6 with significant others.
1:30pm I am homeless looking and in headphones trying to listen to meditation music to keep my cool.
By 2pm, food was done but I was still in my same clothes, hair a wreck, the younger three had run out with the older kids to hunt eggs…
And not the way I had planned.
- The eggs were not counted. Just haphazardly hidden with no clue on the amount.
- The 5 year old had redressed herself.
- They didn’t take their cute target baskets to hunt, but a Kroger Clicklist bag instead …except for the 9 year old who decided to wear his bag on his head.
- My 21 year old snapped a couple of pics of them for me, as I was still on an anxiety fueled fury trying to make the 2pm “curfew”… and the 12 year old made faces, 9 year old had the basket on his head, the 5 year old smiled cute in the clothes she had changed into..
No pics of the older kids.
No cute dress up time for mom.
No perfectly dressed little smiling faces.
But, at the end of the day we all laughed, played games, dove into ice cold water, watched a movie together, and more.
It’s funny. I know this is how it always works out. I know that the idea of perfection isn’t even what I want. And yet, each time I put myself through the stress of striving for that perfect moment…. only to realize, in chaos is where the real moments happen.
Those crazy and chaotic moments are where the stories live.
The older I get, the more I have learned to appreciate the chaos. Maybe one day I can appreciate it the morning of a holiday far before I stress myself out only to realize “Ah, THIS is still good”.
Until then, I will continue to laugh at the reality of “other moms” vs me and be okay with that.