Grandma Got Run Over by a Christmas Goat??

A Christmas several year ago, during a family gift exchange, I acquired a large, white reindeer that has light up ears and sings "Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer." This obnoxious reindeer has stayed with us through several moves. It is really soft and I usually sit him out during the holiday season. Once we adopted Zeke, the reindeer became a source of Christmas entertainment because Zeke is scared to death of the it. There are few things funnier than a 95 lb lab running from a light up reindeer that sings.

Last year, Kerington was interested in the reindeer but kept her distance. She wanted Steve and I to push the button on his foot to start the music, but didn't want to get too close.

This year, when we drug reindeer out of our box of Christmas decorations. Kerington immediately ran to it, hugged it, and told us how much she loved it. She played "Grandma Got Ran Over by a Reindeer" over and over and over, while dancing and wallering reindeer. While Steve and I decorated the tree and set out all of our holiday trinkets, trying to get Kerington involved in the festivities, she hugged and laid on reindeer while repeatedly pushing the start music button. The good news was, we could tell the batteries were about to die. There was no way the reindeer was going to make it to Christmas.

As I was putting the tinsel on the tree, Kerington, reindeer in hand, came up to me and said, "Mommy, take a picture of me and my goat." I laughed out loud. How cute, she thought the white, ear lit, stuffed mammal she was playing with was a goat.

My laughter only increased the number of times the song was played. She kept saying, "I love my goat!!" She wanted to sleep with goat, but I could not bear the thought of being startled awake at 3 a.m. by the screeching of "Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer."

Thankfully on the second day of the "goat," the batteries died. . . but it broke Kerington's heart. She cried, "My goat broken, Daddy fix it." "Goat need battery" "Fix my goat, please" So, alas, we found batteries and the goat is working again. It will be a very Merry Christmas at our house, just be careful grandmas . . . of the goats.