The Plagues (Not Religious) Or: Christmas in September

I got hit in the eye with a fried egg this morning. Not the actual eyeball, just the lid.

Then I got accidentally served last night's coffee in a dirty coffee mug. Oops.

By 5:00 it had been a bad day. The kind where you think maybe you should have crawled UNDER the bed & waited to try again tomorrow.

So I declared Christmas. That's what I do on bad days. Maybe once a year besides the actual holiday, we have need of cinnamon-flavored festivities.

We got a pizza for $6 from Little Caesar's, & the kids were told that they had the time it took us to get the pizza plus 2 min to gather gifts for whomever they could gather gifts for. The rules were no money, no art supplies (because of irrelevant art supply infractions), & no more than 2 min beyond the time spent in the van driving to the pizza place.

We all got home & raced around the house. I wiped the table & swept the floor. Landon got out the sidewalk chalk & created a rock-tossing game akin to skeeball. John got stuff to wash, rub, & slipper Landon's feet. Books were set aside to be read to Abby. And for a finishing touch, I lit some Christmas-scented candles & set paper towels on the table.

They caught fire. I grabbed them & waved them around & grew goggle-eyed as the teeny fire grew flames. The big kids & I screamed. The babies began crying. Landon was stuck on the other side of the kitchen yelling instructions from his foot bath.

When my hand got hot, I threw the paper towels on the floor & started stomping on the fire, yelling, "MY FOOT'S ON FIRE! MY FOOT'S ON FIRE!"

One gray sock & melted shoe later, the fire was out, & the doors were opened to let the smell out as we all shook out the adrenaline.

In came the wasps.