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The Twelve Steps of Christmas

So just returned from our Thanksgiving trek to The Prince's parents house in Washington, D.C. Always nice to get away. Always nice to return to six loads of laundry, queries from editors, party invitations to make (why do I NEVER get to a printer on time!) and pre-holiday anxiety.

I wish I could sum up a nice batch of life lessons like YLM did. Instead I feel like I should offer an alternative: The 12 Steps I Can Never Remember During the Holidays Until It's Too Late and I Collapse Under Piles of Tinsel:

12. Never try to impress your friends with a party. No one cares that you spent days icing 400 dozen cookies. Entenmann's (unfortunately) works just as well.

11. Think champagne cocktails. Think cheap champagne.

10. Wrapping should never cost more than the gift. When did using the comics go out of fashion?

9. Your friends will be embarrassed if you spend too much on their gifts. The babysitter will think you're cheap if you don't.

8. Groups gifts for teachers are a trap. You may think you're done after making a cash contribution, but all the other parents will have their urchins carrying baskets of gourmet cookies and expensive bath salts on the last day of school.

7. Until they start to get an allowance, children never know how much you've spent on their gifts. Until they start to walk, children think the wrapping is the present.

6. Homemade cards cost the same as store bought. And no one notices the little silk ribbons you scour the paper shops for.....

5. The second piece of peppermint bark (champagne cocktail, slice of pumpkin pie, chocolate truffle, glass of egg nog) is always a mistake.

4. You are not Martha Stewart.

3. Everyone hates people who try to be Martha Stewart.

2. The amount of time spent trying to find the perfect gift for your Prince is inversely proportional to the amount of time he will spend on yours.

1. Leaving town for the 5 weeks between Thanksgiving and New Year's Day is what the rich do. You can just cut off the phone and shutter the door, spray on some fake tan and no one will know the difference.

Happy Holidays Y'all.

Comments

KPB said…
How did you know all this about me? I always get to the end of our Christmas gatherings thinking, why aren't the people I really want here, here?
Manhattan Mama said…
I Know! And now I'm throwing a SECOND party for the friends who I really want to see who can't make it to the first party...save me...
Kate B. said…
Oh, it's all so true...

But I LOVE your homemade cards... :-)
Manhattan Mama said…
Okay, You get a homemade card. But JUST you. So tonight was Night One of my nights out with the girls..and I am happy, and drunk. Ahhh..........Now I must focus so I can type in that weird letter puzzle Blogger makes us run through.....
Anonymous said…
8 and 7 are especially spot on.

you know, this list just reminded me that i haven't yet even ADDRESSED the envelopes of my holiday cards, and the post takes about two to three weeks between thailand and the states. oh, bother.

hey, the prince is from dc? from the real district, or, like, the suburbs? at u.v.a. students were always like, "yeah, i'm from dc" and when asked where exactly, they'd say, "well, actually herndon/mclean/gaithersburg/towson/fill-in-the-blank."
Manhattan Mama said…
Ohhh. The REAL district. A fact he's very proud of.....accusing him of being a suburb boy sends him into a quiver.....

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