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Cats in Heat, Christmas and Lots of Questions

Christmas brings up a host of questions, none the least of which was made popular by a song about grandma and some reindeer. Do we open up her gifts or send them back? But there are other questions as well.

Who gets gifts and who gets cards? And who gets gifted an errand disguised as a gift card? Where are we spending Christmas? Do I have to share my eggnog?

If only those were the hardest questions to answer. Instead, the young ones want to know what the word 'virgin' means and why Joe wanted to divorce Mary at one point in the story. I can only send them to their mother so many times before she gets upset with me.

It reminds me of the awkwardness when the female kittens we had bought for our kids got a bit older. The cats started assuming a position of, umm..... uhhh.... expectation? And telling our midgets they were in heat didn't help matters any.

All of these questions lead to a host of other questions. How are babies made? How can babies come around if a mom and dad aren't married? How did Jesus get here if Mary and Joseph weren't married? Is it wrong to compare people to cats and refer to women as being in heat? Where do storks fit into all of this?

We've tried to always be open with our kids and give them only what they were ready for. But even that is often uncomfortable. Maybe that's because life, and the stories of real lives in the Bible, are often messy. If anything, it should keep us from fretting if this will be the perfect Christmas holiday. The original stories were messy, so if our celebrations are a tad frenzied and imperfect, we can be okay with that.
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