It Could Have Been Much Worse, BUT STILL.
As Mr. Husband reached down to open the back of my SUV, time stopped. Alexis stood just to his left. My feet froze to the ground fifteen feet away as my mouth opened wide to yell, "Noooooooo!"
As my voice echoed around the parking lot, he didn't so much as pause. With a dazed and confused look on his face, he kept opening the door, preparing to toss in his bag filled with new shoes. My eyes opened wider and wider as Alexis stood staring into the gaping wide hole the now-open door had left behind.
"What?" Mr. Husband asked.
Then he saw it.
Santa had left a bunch of stuff in the trunk. The back of my car has always been the only safe place for Santa to stow things as Santa seems to be forever trying to pry a certain short person out of her butt. No space in the house is truly sacred, but it's really very easy to just not open the back of the vehicle for a few days.
Or, so Santa thought.
Mr. Husband quickly moved to close the door as he fussed at Alexis to go get in the car.
I knew it was too late. She had most definitely set eyes on something.
Right about then, Santa was crazy grateful that she had stashed the Big Present in a completely different place. All that there was to see was some stocking stuffers like underwear and socks and shampoo and toothpaste. Santa is kind of awesome and only brings junk like that to shove in the snowman-shaped stocking belonging to the short person.
As Mr. Husband and I got back in the car, I glared at him. I prepared to turn on the Nag-o-meter 5000, with intents to set it to Stun.
"What?" he asked. "She didn't see anything."
Given that she was IN THE BACK SEAT, it was interesting that he thought it was a good time for THAT conversation.
"Yes, she did," I replied. I figured the cat was already out of the bag, so I might as well just continue with the debate.
"No way," he went on. "The door wasn't open long enough."
Just then, a tiny high-pitched voice decided to join in on the conversation. "Mommy, why do you have pink Princess paper in the back of your car?"
INDEED. Why do *I* have pink Princess paper in the back of my car? I mean, if it doesn't perfectly match the red and silver and white tree, I don't buy it. Alexis is fully aware that wrapping paper MUST match the tree.
Santa, on the other hand, well, he has TERRIBLE taste in wrapping paper. He even used some hideous Dora stuff one year. Only Santa would ever dream of using tacky pink Princess paper.
I guess Santa is going to have to go find some more wrapping paper.
Sunday, December 19, 2010
Reader Comments (20)
You're a genius. :) I wrap each family member's gift in their own paper (well, except for this year), but making a rule about paper to match the tree, then having Santa be tacky? BRILLIANT!
That could have been bad. Santa here is still trying to figure out when she's going to have time to procure that special paper and keep it hidden - as we drive the sleigh over the river and through the woods the day before Christmas Eve. Already E saw MJ's gift from Santa - so that got scrapped.
Kids are so perceptive.
Husbands, not so much.
@Jayna--True story, that last line. o_O
Santa sneaks into our house while we're in Indy, so Alexis doesn't find the treasure until we return home. It worked well last year, especially for helping to spread out some of the "joy" over a few extra days. Hopefully this year will work out, too.
I have the same problem (getting the gifts into the house without someone scoping them out), so I have started keeping a blanket in the car. That way, if they do happen to stumble across the stash, at least it is somewhat disguised.
We have the problem of getting all of Santa's loot to Indy (courtesy of Nanny and Papa who make a trip to Ohio a couple of weeks prior), so that Santa can actually bring gifts on Christmas morning. Times 5 kids, this gets a bit tricky! :)
That's awesome. I'd do the same thing :) 'Course, I'm the one who hides my stuff in the trunk. Claire (who's almost 6) did find one thing this year which I made her forget about. My mum has a special roll of paper that is ONLY for Santa presents. We CANNOT forget that, and we have to remember from year to year because Heaven forbid Claire remembers, too.
We haven't reached the age where Landon knows anything about Santa. Heck, he is only nine months old after all. Thank goodness though. I don't think I'm ready for that stage yet. We'll probably have a lot of close calls like that when the time does come though.
I just picture everything going on slow motion, haha! Good luck finding some new paper, I had trouble finding just the right paper this year. I think this will be the first year that my son could possibly remember the Christmas. I am still on the fence about wrapping gifts from Santa. I want to wrap them because I think being able to open things just makes it even better, but everyone else insists Santa just leaves the toys out.
My mom just told me this week that she would always take a roll of black trash bags with her when she went Christmas shopping so she could just put everything into that, and leave it in the car or hide it in the house.
In our house Santa gifts get wrapped in paper with Santa on it. All other gifts are in other paper. Then, in addition to putting out milk and cookies for Santa, we put the Santa paper out and tell our child that we provide the paper for Santa to wrap his gifts. This way, if he sees the paper in the house, he knows we are providing it for Santa.
Ay yi yi. Why are men such rookies?
Santa always wraps his gifts (ugh! you KNOW how I feel about that) only with paper graced with his face. He's a narcissist like that. ;)
This time of year, kids have eagle eyes and miss NOTHING. Good luck to Santa in finding more wrapping paper.
TWICE now I have been caught with stocking stuffers (only). Whew. But yeah. They're getting difficult. It was much easier when they were completely oblivious. Sigh.
Glad it wasn't THE present.
And I think we have to find a new present for next year or install some combo lock on the storage room in the back of our house.
Oh, been there a few times this year. It gets harder, as they get older.
I didn't realize that Dicks would deliver the Sidney Crosby knee hockey set in its box, just with the packing slip attached. I was having a bad day, tired, and it was leaning against the door. My eldest spotted it, and I was cranky, couldn't think, yelled at the boys TO JUST STAY IN THE CAR. What is that, mommy? I don't know JUST STAY IN THE CAR. I'm frantically running up to the door, eldest is sneaking up, little terd, I run it up to my craft room, he asks, what was that, mommy? It then occurs to me to say, just something for mommy's crafts (that made me freak out, for some reason). It passed.
I think things have to be delivered to husband's work next year.
We are getting a Wii this year, and mommy bought herself the Sims game. It was sitting out in my craft room, and the five year old, who can read "wii" apparently, asked why I had a Wii game in my room. ERRR, I don't know. Hopefully, he will have forgotten when mommy pulls it out to play.
Darn it. Santa has to get smarter, pay attention a little better.
I always "buy" Santa some paper and leave it for him in case he runs out with all the presents that my "good" children are going to get. :)
I am certain that you could still find Pittsburgh wrapping paper somewhere in the 'burgh. Steelers, Penguins, probably not Pirates though...
Oh no! That could have been disasterous! Thank goodness the paper distracted her from all the other goodies! Paper can be replaced! ;) Whew!
When I was growing up Santa gifts were never wrapped; my mom made the excuse that they didn't need to be wrapped since they arrived in the night while we slept. Also, with four of us, she didn't have to worry about us recognizing the writing on the tags. The gifts were usually pretty self-explanatory about who they belonged to.
She and my dad would also rope off the stairs, and we were not allowed to go down until 7am. The youngest always got to go first (and I said "boo" to that).
Next year dear husband and I will get to figure out how we want to do this for our little munchkin...though it'll be a year or two before he remembers any of it.
Santa did not wrap gifts when we were growing up, and he does not wrap them now. Saves stress and $ and getting caught, something I had never thought of. Phew!
I stash everything in the laundry room. I'm the only person who's ever been there;)
You people who don't wrap scare me. Santa wraps! Always!
Dood, at least she was smart enough to ask you about what she saw. Otherwise The Question would have plagued you all week.