Well that’s Christmas for another year!

Ian has taken the boys out for a bit so I thought I’d quickly jump on and post!

We had a lovely restful Christmas at my Dad’s. The meal was gorgeous, the kids really enjoyed their day and got spoiled rotten. I’ve been very tired from my chemo but apart from that am doing fine, so all things considered, it was a great Christmas!

I am SO bloated from the chemo- it’s horrendous. Even my face is all puffy. I kept having dreams the other night that everyone was calling me “Pig Woman” behind my back- this may have some basis in truth… 😛

I am very excited to have my last round of chemo on 13th January. I so want to put it behind me. The water weight should come off pretty quickly from what they are telling me, maybe six weeks or so, and I’m going to start a new regime after that. We’ll see!

I have a month of radiotherapy still to do as well, but hopefully by Easter will be able to put this madness behind me.

I really feel like the coming year is full of hope for a better future. I have big plans to score some of my items off my “to do before I die” list- we’re already planning a family trip to Rathlin Island on the north coast for early summer. I plan to live it large in 2009.

Pig Woman can feck off- she isn’t me. 😀

Hope you all had a wonderful Christmas. Here’s to wonderful things for all of us in 2009!

Christmas is freaking me out!

I’m delighted to report that I’ve finally made great inroads into my Christmas shopping for this year. Isn’t Amazon wonderful- I used to get totally frazzled wandering around Belfast’s city centre every year, running the gauntlet of people trying to sign you up for monthly contributions to various charities, and believe me, they are there to do their job (!!), trying to struggle through the crowds, not being able to find the stuff I went in for, and then not being able to remember what floor of the multi storey I parked the bloody car on…stress!!

So, being able to do it all on the computer is brilliant in my eyes. 🙂

I just have the kids to buy for now. When I hear my friends discussing the stuff they’ve bought for their children though, it makes me feel woefully inadequate because I can’t begin to justify the amount of expenditure that they seem able to cope with for kid’s presents.

Our house is STUFFED with toys. Seriously, most nights I get home and want to take a shovel to it! 😀

You’ll laugh at me for this, but I know Ricky would love a digital camera, and I looked into it today. The children’s toughened cameras from V-tech and Fisher Price got terrible reviews, so in the end, I bought him a second hand 5mp small digital camera which should be easy for him to hold. It cost £20 (about $50) which is about half what the aforementioned kid’s ones were, and hopefully will do the job. Plus at that price, if he kills it, I won’t get too upset.

I personally feel that Christmas has got taken over by materialism. I don’t want my kids to grow up obsessed with who has had the most money spent on them, which labels they have, and how many “things” they’re going to get. Maybe it’s inevitable. I also don’t want them growing up feeling deprived because Ian and I don’t want to bankrupt ourselves over Christmas!

Hmmm…a fine line. I also suspect that the line will become finer with every passing year as the kids get older!

Santa now delivers to bold boys

Ricky was in one of those moods last night where nothing we said or did had any effect on his behaviour whatsoever. It doesn’t happen often, but with me just having had the chemo and Ian frantically trying to do everything, we were both a bit at our wit’s end.

Eventually, in desparation and for the first time ever, I tried to wheel out the age-old threat of “Ricky, if you continue this bold behaviour, Santa won’t come. He doesn’t come to bold boys”.

This did not have the desired effect. Fixing me with a sceptical stare, head cocked to one side and with his hands on his hips, my three year old replied, “Now, Mummy…that’s not REALLY going to happen, is it?”

Clearly he and Santa are in close cahoots. I am left bewildered by my lack of authority, missing the one arsenal of tactical behaviour modification that I thought would always work.

Santa had better get his ass in gear, as his new regulations regarding delivieries to bold children will no doubt leave him and the elves rather short handed in the run up to Christmas Eve….