Happy Advent everyone!

(We moved (and assembled) a ridiculous amount of furniture this past weekend and my computer is currently in about a dozen (unassembled) pieces. Thus the weak-sauce picture taken with a phone. Better processed pics to come soon.)

I made my own Advent wreath this year, and (although you can’t really tell from this photo) I think it turned out pretty dang well. I am not a particularly crafty person. In fact, I almost had a panic attack in Michaels yesterday. I happened upon some crazy sale that everyone and their mother new about. There were oodles of woman constructively evaluating Christmas decorations, creating beautiful bunches of faux holly and poinsettias…

And then there’s me. Trying hard to decide whether the flowers were faux or not without sniffing them…

I got out of there as quickly as possible by grabbing a whole bunch of stuff at eye level and tossing it in my basket along with all the items Mo grabbed from her eye-level and also managed to toss in my basket.

Note to self: Next time you go to Michaels, please, please, please put Mo in a cart. No matter how well she is behaving in the car, as soon as she enters that store she will transform into a little stinker that can neither see nor hear you. She will alternate blatant refusal to come when called, with full on panic when you leave her line of sight. She will also touch every.single.thing she can. Literally running her hand along the items at her level as if the shelves were walls. They are not walls. They are indeed full of items. And those items will proceed to fall to the ground in a very loud and embarrassing way.

There are busy, focused people in Michaels. Especially around Christmas. They are rather unforgiving of a two-year-old patiently replacing all the dropped items into their proper spot. Even if she is ridiculously adorable when she says “Uh oh. Mo sorry” and tries to put them all back.

You will end up apologizing a lot and hurriedly throwing all 627 un-painted wood ornaments back on the shelf under the glaring-eye of a sales associate.

And speaking of patience, yours will run rather thin. You’re already intimidated by all the other women (and some men) who seem to have a plan and know the difference between this garland and that garland. Just put Mo-bug in the cart. Hand her something shiny. Shop. And get the heck out of there. 

…

And in regardes to the title of this post: both Mo and I sing.

Below.

This video is simultaneously embarrassing for me and ridiculously awesome for Mo.  For my musically inclined friends, please ignore the occasional sharp or flat coming from me and just enjoy my adorable daughter “playing” the piano and singing along.