Christmas Crankies.

Christmas made me realize one very important fact: I am a jolly fat man, trapped inside a cranky fat woman’s body. Perhaps this is how the transgendered feel!

Our Christmas was low key, but still really enjoyable. Christmas Eve, my parents came over for pizza and merriment, followed by our traditional holiday gift exchange. Dave got me a breadmaker (handy for the South Beach Diet we’re thinking of starting – more on this later), some sewing gadgets, a box of bandages for future sewing mishaps, and an itunes gift card from the dogs.

My parents gave me some books I wanted – one on sewing, one on women entrepreneurs, and one on starting a home-based business. And a down alternative comforter for our bed. And some gift cards for Home Depot. We’re going to extend our deck (!!!!!) in the spring, so they bought us the gift cards to put towards lumber. Or a nice wooden swing. Our choice.

I actually bought Dave a really great gift. For $99, he can take a discovery flight at a local airport. He’ll get 30 minutes of ground instruction, then take a 45 minute flight where he gets to take the controls & fly the plane. How cool is that?!?

And my parents bought Mason some really good toys. A musical elephant, a bunch of teethers, and a huge pack of discovery toys. And the Radio Flyer rocket we fell in love with.

Christmas Day was chaotic. We did our $10 family gift exchange. I ended up with a car costume – a pair of antlers & a red nose, to make the car look like Rudolph. It’s very cute, but will have to wait until next year. Dave got a couple of stuffed Christmas moose that my aunt snagged at a garage sale for $5 and a blanket.

We ate too much, but my new mashed potatoes were a big hit. I quartered about 25 medium red potatoes, and threw them (with the skins on) in a pot of salted water with minced garlic. I left them cook for about 30 minutes, drained them, then mashed them with a stick of butter and 2 cups of half & half. I also threw in some more minced garlic, some dried onion, and about a cup of shredded parmesan cheese. I left them in the slow cooker on the warm setting all day; then turned them on low about an hour before we ate (just to get them good & hot). They were sooo good, and much easier to prepare than peeling all those baking potatoes. And leaving the skin on gave them a bit of color and left a little of the vitamin in the potato. It made 20 servings, and each serving was only 210 calories & 9 grams of fat. Not bad for mashed potatoes, especially when my family usually makes them with whole milk and 2 pounds of velveeta and a ton of butter.

The only downfall? Mason had a MAJOR meltdown when we got home last night. He was passed around like a plate of brownies all afternoon, and needed to come home and unwind after being overstimulated all day. He cried and cried and cried for about an hour, until he fell into an exhausted sleep. Poor peanut. And tomorrow, we’re supposed to drag him to my brother’s house, 2-1/2 hours south of here for another fun-filled day of Pass The Baby.

Now that Christmas is over, we’re all thinking of great gifts we should have asked for. A web cam, for when The Husband travels next year. A pair of snow pants for The Husband, since we’ve had 40″ of snow in December, setting a new record for the highest snowfall ever on record for December.

It was a bad month, and I’ll be happy to flip the calendar to January. The weather was terrible, and I never managed to get Mason to the mall for a picture with Santa. Bad momma!!!

Did you do anything worth mentioning? Were you able to check a few items off your wishlist? Did you snag any post-Christmas bargains today?

In any case, I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas, and are looking forward to the new year as much as I am.