Bullet-Pointed Christmas

Please verify that Spouse and I are not the only ones who send emails like this during the holidays.  Explanatory notes bracketed and in Italics, actual text of the email appearing as regular text.

Christmas-related bullet points:

• When you pick up C., tell him that I have K's body spray (Vanilla Bean Noel - the girl equivalent of Axe; I sampled the lotion, and now I reek), and a bag to put it and the giraffe ornament in.  He needs to remember to take her gift and the chameleon glasses to school tomorrow.

 

[These are the chameleon glasses.  They are Big Kid's gift exchange item for swim team.  He picked them because they look, sort of, like goggles.  But are totally unusable as such, on account of how they have no lenses.

Giraffes are the source of a private joke between Big Kid and his girlfriend.]

• P. needs to bring his teacher gifts tomorrow as well.

[I have had Little Kid's teacher gifts for weeks and fully intended to send them up to school early, on the theory that it would be one less thing for a teacher to carry home on the last day of school.  Of course, I utterly failed to follow through on this awesome suggestion-to-self.]

• I found an appropriately sized flag case for Dad’s casket flag (also got a free bottle of body lotion for Nana when I bought K.’s stuff) and got the balance of J.’s gift while I was out today, so the only things remaining on my to-do list involve picking up Water Gardens photos at Barron Photografix and buying replacement (actual human-sized) boot cuffs for L.G. at the antique mall.  Intentionally pushed off those two trips because they are off of the beaten path and can be accomplished Saturday AM while the unwashed masses are the (non-antique) malls.  

[My dad died almost two years ago.  We are just now getting around to putting his flag in a thingy.  Which is okay, I suppose, given that we purchased room in the crypt at his church for his ashes, the tab for which has long since been paid for, but Dad's still in a box in Mom's room.  Baby steps.

 

I ordered crocheted boot cuffs for my friend's nine year-old daughter through Etsy.  The item listing said "child"-sized.  I bought them based on a general working knowledge of Etsy sites and an understanding that "infant" means infant, "toddler" means toddler, and "child" means a smallish human who is nevertheless bigger than an infant or a toddler.  Yeah, what arrived are toddler-sized as best.  Little Kid couldn't even get them over his feet, and Little Kid is pretty tiny.] 
 

• While “I” am basically finished, “you” are not – still need to finish Christmas for A. and birthday for Z. (framing gift cards for both?) and Christmas for B. ($25 Harbor Freight gift card).

[I shop for all of the women and girls, plus Spouse and the kids, neighbors, teachers, ministers, friends, etc.; Spouse shops for his three brothers and one male nephew, plus me.  That's five people on Spouse's list, and eleven-ty million-trillion on mine, but I always end up finishing first.] 

• I am still waiting on two packages – a scarf for M. and the hymn wall hanging for T. and L.  Both are set to be delivered to the house.  Everything else I was waiting for arrived at the office when I was out yesterday.

[I have always felt like we were weird gifters - not in the sense of weird people who gift, although that probably applies, too, but in the sense of gifters who gift weird stuff - and seeing "giraffe ornament," "chameleon glasses," "casket flag case," "crocheted boot cuffs" and "hymn wall hanging" in the above communique pretty much seals the deal.]