Do more this holiday season

It's a quiet morning in our home, so far. Only one mini me is awake, and she's snuggled up in a chair watching "Sofia the First."

The coffee in my cup is fresh. I just brewed it.

There are two pies in the oven I made last night and a dish of squash in the refrigerator to go with dinner later. I've picked out a few bottles of wine to enjoy with family on this Thanksgiving.

We aren't hosting the holiday, but I love food and I love to cook and bake, so I offered to do as much as I could.

I wish I could do more.

Because I have a warm house, and others do not.

Social experiments: The spiritual cup

After a week of whatever the heck virus kicked my 3-year-old's tush, I think Josie is finally on the way to good health.

Now Charlie has it. We're on day four of vomit, though she might have skipped a day and I just don't remember. Sleeping (if you can call it that) sitting up with a trash can next to your bed for your 2-year-old to puke into tends to blur time and days.

I'm hoping this isn't going to be the beginning of a repeat of Winter 2012-13.

I refuse to panic about this. We're back to popsicles, Pedialyte and watered down juice. Charlie refuses to eat solid food, I think more out of fear of how much it will hurt if she throws up again. At the very least, I need to try every trick in the book to get fluids into her.

But all this trying to get them healthy is exhausting, and I hate to complain about my babies because they can't help what's happening, so on Sunday the kids stayed home with the Boy and off to church I went. I had a pie fundraiser to help button up so we could start baking on Monday. And my spiritual cup needed a refill.

No less a rock star

Sick kids are the worst.

It sucks.

It's not just sucky because they're sick, though. Sadly, it's more because the problem can't always be fixed and as a parent it makes you feel helpless. You spend all your time guiding, teaching, snuggling, kissing away the ouchies.

But then along comes a virus that wreaks havoc on your preschooler's intestinal tract and leaves in its wake little hands and little feet and, in our case, even a little nose covered in hives.

The magic of Christmas

It's right around the corner. I know it's coming and I'm just not ready for it yet. Not one bit. No ounce of me is prepared, with the exception of having picked up on some clearance sales.

It's Christmas.

No, I don't want to think about it yet. We haven't even gotten through Thanksgiving yet. I refuse - REFUSE, I tell you - to get the tree up or pull my Dickens village houses out before Nov. 29. I did break down and hang some jingle bells on the front door. I probably have broken my own rules just with that one smooth move.

It's hard. So, so hard.

In the moment ... but not really

I'm really bad about writing things in the moment. You know, something spectacular happens and then I don't write about it right away and two days later I try to ... and it all sounds like shit. This is because of my kids. I blame them. They're so needy and I, like, never get time to do things I want to do like pour out my soul in one shot.

So, jump into my time machine. I'm taking you back to Tuesday Nov. 12, 2013. Are you there? Good. Because this is going to be written like it all happened today.

*que funky time machine wavy mirage visual effects*