Watch Out Santa...Assembly Required

Yes, we're still Jingle Bell Rockin'....all this month. My prize this week is a signed copy of Lone Star Beasts (books one and two of my High Plains Shifters series) along with a deck of Ellora's Cave playing cards. Comment it up, folks, and one of you will win my prize to be announced on Friday by our own Natalie Dae!

My biggest holiday memories often come from the most STRESSFUL moments. I know you know what I'm talking about. Every year, when the kids were little, my honey and I would head out to do our Santa Shopping. We'd have our completed list of requests and hit Toys R Us hoping they'd have 'in stock' the most popular toys of the season. Without fail, every year there was at least one thing that was sold out, out of stock or SOMETHING. Now, let me say right off the bat that I'm married to a hard-headed man. God love him! He's one of those...I can DO IT...guys who relishes the idea of getting out the tool box and putting stuff together. Unfortunately for me, he likes company when he does it and if slot A doesn't fit properly into slot B and the directions happen to be in Chinese then I know for a fact this little 'assembly endeavor' is going to test my patience BIG TIME.

So what is wrong with paying Toys R Us a $20 fee for assembling that bike? Not a dang thing, I always say. They'll do it there, do it right and no nasty tempers are involved. I'm all about avoiding that. But Mr. Reg? No, I believe he thrives on controversy. Just my luck. We've been married for 28 years and I've long ago given up on convincing him to just 'hire the professionals'. He's not going to do it.

Our most interesting Christmas Eve assembly project happened many years ago when our son was just a little dude. I think maybe six or seven. He was MAD about Ghostbusters. The movie was huge and the stores were stocked with all sorts of Ghostbusters junk. From nerf Ghost Blasters to action figures to the Ghostbusters car. He wanted it all. So that's exactly what Santa got him. Every Christmas Eve we have a big bash at our house where family comes, we listen to Christmas music and we have a big spread set up in the dining room. The day had been consummed with getting everything ready, dealing with the little ones, etc. You know the drill. So by the time the kids are calmed down and in bed, it was well after 1 am. We were exhausted but had to do the Santa stuff.

We took care of the carrots (for the reindeer), the cookies and the milk, careful to leave crumbs and such so the kids would have evidence Santa had been there. Everything else was set out under the tree when we got to the assembly of the Ghostbusters Firehouse. Remember the movie? They operated from an old firehouse complete with the fireman's pole they'd slide down when they went after the ghosts. So we open the box, my husband confident this would be a snap. I wasn't nearly so optimistic when I found all the hundreds of little pieces and pages and pages of assembly instructions. At least they were in English! Surprisingly all went well until I reached into the bottom of the box. I'd pulled out a HUGE ROLL OF STICKERS. The entire firehouse had numbered stickers to use in decorating the thing. So we began with number one, found the spot and began applying the damn things. To give you an example of how tedious this job was, let me just say that sticker number 218 was a teeny tiny DOORKNOB. It took us hours of fitting the stickers to the right spot and at one point, I believe I remarked the elves' fingers were definitely needed to do this right. They have little hands, right? Two frustrating hours later we poured ourselves into bed.

By five am, our bright eyed babies were standing by our bed shouting that Santa had come and we had to get up RIGHT NOW and come see. We both groaned realizing we'd slept a total of two hours. It was gonna be a looooong day.

Care to share some of your "Santa Assembly" nightmares?