Tag Archive for: Christmas past

Christmas Past

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I’ve celebrated a lot of Christmases. As a child, we had great ones despite my parents not having much money. My sister and I always had surprises when we woke on Christmas morning. Some of my favorites were a two story doll house built by my dad with furniture my aunt made. One year I received a Shirley Tempe doll with a carriage. (I broke the doll not long after Christmas, but that another story.) My dad made me a two-wheel bike during the war when no one could buy one. I always received books, which I managed to read before the day was over. Storybook dolls were also a wonderful present. When I got older, clothes and books were the presents I wanted.

With my own children, I tried to carry on some of the same gift giving habits–even making some items. Hubby built a Barbie doll house for our oldest daughter and I made the furniture. When the kids were little I only worked off and on–but usually before Christmas so I could pay for the presents.

When we lived in Oxnard and my folks were still in L.A. and the kids were small, we often spent Christmas at Grandma’s house–doing things much like we’d done when I was a kid.

One Christmas I wasn’t around for the gift opening because I had to work an early a.m. shift for the phone company. That was not fun.

When my family grew and grew, we had Christmas at home and I cooked the Christmas dinner.

Kids grew up, got married and for awhile we managed to have a Christmas celebration at either my house or my sisters with our combined families. Eventually there were way too many of us.

As time went on, and grand kids and great-grandkids arrived, each family started their own tradition.

For the last few years, we’ve had Christmas Eve dinner for a few of the grandkids who wanted to come with a present exchange. On Christmas morning, we headed over to the daughter’s who lives nearby and watched her grandkids unwrap givfts.

This year, I think hubby and I will go to the movies on Christmas Day, something we’ve never done before.

What this all proves, is nothing stays the same.

We will enjoy our Christmas no matter what. I’m thankful we’ve had the blessing of so many past Christmases.

I wish you all a wonderful Holiday Season no matter what or how you celebrate, Happy Chanukah, Merry Christmas and a blessed New Year.

Marilyn

A Wonderful Christmas Past

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Years ago I belonged to a sorority–no, not the college kind, this one was social–whose primary purpose seemed to be having fun. We had once a week get-togethers and a party once a month at someone’s house which our husbands were invited to. There was always a theme and we usually danced. We also had get-togethers with other sororities in our area, ones where we wore long dresses.

During this time I was a teacher at a pre-school for developmentally disabled kids.

It bothered me that our sorority didn’t do any service projects, I’d never belonged to anything where we didn’t do anything useful for anyone else. One of the consultants who worked with the kids at our school told me about a family with three kids, one developmentally disabled, and the father had lost his job and they had no money for Christmas.

I approached the sorority members, told them about the situation and proposed that we provide Christmas for this family. The women thought this was a great idea. We found out the ages of the children and everyone bought gifts. We also got a tree and decorated it. (This was before they sold all the pre-decorated phony trees.)

We gathered all the food needed for a Christmas dinner including homemade pies and some extra groceries too.

We loaded up the back of my station wagon (I always had station wagons, after all, we had five kids) and four of my sorority sisters went with me on delivery day. We located the address, an apartment house. A man was working on his car in front of one of the garages. We called out and asked if he knew this particular family. He said that was his family.

“Great, we have something for you.”

He looked bewildered, but started helping us carry everything upstairs to their apartment. He opened the door and we brought everything in. The mom and kids stared at us wide-eyed and open-mouthed.

When we’d deposited everything, the man asked, “Who did this? Where did this all come from?”

One of the gals said, “You have heard of Santa Claus haven’t you?”

We left giggling all the way down the stairs and on the drive back home. What a wonderful feeling that was and I didn’t feel quite so bad about belonging to a sorority that’s primary goal was having fun.

Marilyn
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