St. Nicholas Day!

Friday was St. Nicholas Day!  For those of you who weren't raised Catholic, or have no idea who St. Nicholas was, here's a handy Wikipedia article.  To sum up: St. Nick is a Catholic saint; his feast day is December 6, and he's the precursor to Santa Claus.

Also, St. Nick Day is in Shortcake's Top 5 holidays ever.

St. Nick was very generous this year.  Here's all the books he got Shortcake:

 

She read Alice in tumblr-Land and Fortunately, the Milk in one day.  The Hunger Games was so she could have a matching set (she already had Catching Fire and Mockingjay in hardback).  She's currently reading Running Like a Girl (because Shortcake is female and a runner), and next up will be Mark Twain's Christmas.  And the ornament in the middle is her ornament this year.

St. Nick brought treats for Santa at Macy's too - coffee and chocolate and clementines and nuts.  (Traditional treats)  And Santa brought donuts.

The best present St. Nick brought Shortcake was... wait for it... a UKULELE!

Shortcake has been wanting one because she wants to learn to play it.  She used to play the oboe, but those are expensive, require reeds, and are not easily pulled out around a campfire in post apocalyptic society.  Ukuleles are light, easy to carry while running from zombies, and, if Shortcake gets good at it, will earn her a valued place in post apocalyptic society.  And then she won't get eaten.  By zombies.  These are Shortcake's major concerns.  Also, getting sat on by a very large person and falling through fire escape stairs.

Anyway.  We were busy all day, partly because Macy's declared it national Believe Day (Shortcake thinks someone was raised Catholic and looked at a calendar), and because New Jersey and Connecticut didn't have school.  We thought Monday would be busy because it's the day after the Feast of the Immaculate Conception (Catholic kids got lucky this year - a holy day of obligation fell on a Sunday, so they don't have to go twice in one week), and we figured schools would take Monday off.  Apparently, schools took Friday off.  So we were slammed.

Before the kids showed up, Shortcake, Krampus and Lucky had a dance party in the house.  Santa had a delayed reaction, but then he also participated.  St. Nick Day dance parties=awesome.

And then the day turned sour.  SOMEONE - probably an elf, probably from last Sunday, left their coffee under Santa's present.  Shortcake keeps Santa's water under his present, so she was not expecting a 5 day old cup of cold coffee to be there, and then she spilled it.  All over her arm and the floor.  While a family was coming in to visit.  So she ran to get paper towels and cleaned it up.  If that elf is ever discovered...  Naughty list.  For sure.

AND THEN.  Shortcake was attacked by a door.  The door ran over her foot.  She was wearing her sparkly shoes in honor of St. Nick Day, so she was not protected. 

Okay, so she didn't bleed, but there is a huge bruise.  Shortcake was wounded in the line of duty.

But she got a ukulele, so all in all the day turned out okay.

Santa was excited about the ukulele too.