With Thanksgiving in the rearview mirror, it was finally time to dress up the Christmas tree. We donned the spiky branches with glass ornaments.

That was the first mistake.

A day later, I saw the boys happily playing together. I snuck away for some quiet time. (Read: stress-eat candy and listen to doomsday murder mysteries until my heart beats at 280 a second.)

That was the second and fatal mistake.

In my absence, the boys had taken up the classic American sport of baseball. They used their Lightsabers as bats, and the christmas ornaments became their baseballs.

They gleefully smashed through the bottom half of the tree. Even the cat helped to knock off ornaments from his perch atop the piano. Finally, I clued in that the noises were not coming from my true crime podcast after all. I emerged to find a deceptively sparkling living room floor.

There was too much glass for them to help, so I employed what every American mother since 1776 has used as a punishment: guilt tripping! They sat with backs against the wall as Mommy cleaned up the carnage. My hope was that they’d feel bad watching me clean up their mess. At the very least, they would be bored to literal tears while watching me clean up their mess.

The ruse worked. After timeout, these little boys decided to fix the tree for Mommy by donating their very favorite toys for decorative purposes. All was forgiven ❤

But next year… we’re going plastic.