Why This Christmas Holidays Is Different

It’s day six of the school holidays. Usually by now I’d be in a neurotic heap but this Christmas holidays something has changed.

The loss of twenty innocent children in Connecticut has been an awful reminder of how precious life is and how in the blink of an eye our children can be snatched away.

So today my kids and I played like it was our last.

We ate waffles and drank lemonade for breakfast. Then we put the iPads away for the day.

I let them do things that normally irritate me. Like bringing everything in from the toy room and making a cubby house under the dining table with my good blankets, then leaving it all there for me to tidy up.

I let Holly paint a beautiful painting on my kitchen table without worrying about the mess she’d inevitably make, and did make.

We watched Toy Story 3 and I cried when Andy gave Woody away at the end.

We played cards with a whole stack of mismatched decks while we ate the box of chocolates I was saving for Christmas Day.

Holly and Luca’s school reports came in the post and we put them to one side. To be looked at another day.

Then this afternoon when the kids were all playing spies together, I watched them from a distance and rather than seeing it as an opportunity to slip away and do some housework, or play on Twitter and Facebook, I sat back and just watched.

So tonight as I tucked my precious four children in to bed, even though I thought it was already full, my heart filled with even more love … and I said a little prayer of gratitude for my little monkeys that at times drive me insane but who ultimately my life would be destroyed without.

Because you just never know when that heart may shatter into a million pieces.

Watching Toy Story 3