Dear Santa,

I’ve been a good mom all year. I’ve fed, cleaned and cuddled my child on demand, I wake at any given hour for night tremors. Her clothes are always clean and her wardrobe is way, WAY bigger than mine. She has out grown more shoes in the last three months than I’ve purchased for my self in the last five years. I clean up the insta-messes so my husband doesn’t have to. And I do her hair even though she acts like I’m scalping her when I do it.

I was hoping you could spread my list out over several Christmases, since I had to write this letter with the dried out permanent marker my daughter normally uses to draw what appears to be tribal tattoos allover herself, on the back of a receipt in the basement while doing laundry between cycles, cause I’m trying to be a better wife about that laundry bit. Who knows when I’ll find anymore free time in the next 18 years, perhaps I’ll transcribe it to my blog in the middle of the night or when I’m supposed to be working, on my break of course.

Here are my Christmas wishes:

I’d like a head immune to headaches and arms that don’t flap in the breeze; but are strong enough to massage my husband when ever he asks me too, and a few times when he doesn’t ask.

I’d also like a waist, since I lost mine somewhere in the seventh month of my last pregnancy, preferably the one I had around 2001, would be nice.

If you’re hauling big ticket items this year I’d like a debt free existence and the savings to send my kid to the schools I want to. I 300 gb tivo so I can keep up with anything I want to watch. and A radio that automatically gets the music I like downloaded every Tuesday; and a refrigerator with a secret compartment behind the crisper where I can hide the stuff I’d like to be there when I actually want to have it.

On the practical side, I could use a kid who doesn’t argue all the time, Sometimes is okay, but who can be okay saying okay mommy with out a twenty minute tantrum first. and five pairs of actual pants not jeans and a half a dozen jeans that will not wear out in the crotch. I could also use a recording of Tibetan monks chanting Don’t eat in the living room and Take your hands off your fathers laptop, because my voice seems to be just out of my child’s hearing range and can only be heard by the dog,and even he ignores me.

If it’s too late to find any of these products, I’d settle for enough time to brush my teeth and style my hair in the same morning, or the luxury of cooking and cleaning in the same night.

If you don’t mind, I could also use a few Christmas miracles to brighten the holiday season. Would it be too much trouble to declare ketchup a vegetable? I’d also go for planting the idea in my mother and grandmothers head that I’m not going to kill their grandchild. Make her clothes grow with her, and if at all possible magically increase my income with every child
automatically. It will clear my conscience immensely.

It would be helpful if you could coerce my child to help around the house without demanding payment as if she were the boss of an organized crime family.

Well, Santa, the buzzer on the dryer is ringing and my daughter can’t stand to see me on the computer, I think she wants her marker back.

Have a safe trip and remember to leave your wet boots by the door and come in and dry off so you don’t catch cold.

Help yourself to cookies on the table but don’t eat too many or leave crumbs on the carpet.

Yours Always, MOM

P.S. One more thing…you can cancel all my requests if you
can keep my children young enough to believe in Santa.

**this is a revised version of an email I received