A kid-dressing robot, the ability to control time, and 9 other things I want for Christmas

It’s the most wonderful time of the year. Particularly if you’re someone who likes lists.

Because it seems as though every December the universe conspires to give parents nothing short of a thousand lists: things to do, things to give, things to buy, things to bake, things to donate, things to clean, and things to attend. I don’t know about you, but I’m pretty much overwhelmed with lists.

So with that in mind, I figure what’s one more?

Except this one is a little different because this one is just for me. This one is the list of things I want.

Here are 11 simple holiday requests that would make me happy this December:

1. A morning tea that’s still hot when I’m taking the last sip. You know, instead of that one I keep reheating each time I’m called upon to find a certain toy, fill a water glass, or wipe a bum.
2. The luxury of leaving all the gift-giving to Santa this year. I would even be happy if he could lend me just one little elf (as long as it’s not that tattletale one on the shelf – no need for Santa to know everything about me, now, is there?).
3. For my preschooler to, for the rest of his life, replace “because” with the word he created: “cuzin”.
4. A family picture for the holiday card with not one, not two, but all three kids smiling and looking at the camera. Bonus points if the chronically messy kid’s hair is brushed. Double bonus points if the kindergartener who has been choosing her own outfits since she was a toddler isn’t wearing her metallic pink leggings with the hole in one knee.
5. One of those perfect-for-the-refrigerator drawings (with that beautiful name we chose scrawled almost illegibly at the top) that reminds me of how awesome it is to be someone’s mama.
6. One, just one, bedtime that goes exactly how the beautiful checklist on the wall (that we copied from Pinterest, no less) says it should. Why don’t these kids notice that there’s no pretty little check box for “Ask for another drink of water while demanding a new song to listen to on the way to bathroom for the third pee of the evening,” on that thing?
7. A nap.
8. The ability to control time. To slow it down when I’m listening to my littlest son tell me the cutest story in the world, or laughing at a joke (a real joke – that’s actually funny) that my 8-year-old just made up. And to speed it up when my kids are finished singing their part at the school holiday concert and there’s still an hour to go.
9. A snow-clothes robot. A marvelous technological wonder that would dress small children in snowpants, jackets, hats, scarves, boots, and mittens. And hand grown-ups a tea on the way out the door each morning. (A mom can dream.)
10. A chance to go back to the days when my children were babies, if only for a moment. To hold them in my arms. To stare into their tiny, innocent faces, smoosh their soft, round cheeks and breathe in that new baby smell just one more time.
11. A reminder to live in the moments of their childhood. To prove right all the people telling me that these are the best years of my life. Because they are. It’s just hard to remember that when I’m wiping someone else’s booger from the shoulder of my brand new shirt and trying to check off one of the many items from one of my thousand lists.

It’s not too much to ask, is it? Okay, maybe the nap is pushing it.