I was reminiscing today about Christmases from my childhood. I love Christmas today! I love the traditions, songs, gift giving, decorating, cookie baking, tree decorating, present wrapping....I love it all! I think it's due to the traditions that were instilled in me when I was young.
We used to get two weeks off for Christmas break. The whole two weeks were usually spent at my grandparents house. We called them Maamaw and Pop. My sister and I went up to their house first before my parents came up. That week was so much fun. These were the days before internet, cable tv and iphones. We had to make our own fun. And we did too!
My grandparents lived out on a farm so there was always places to explore and things to get into. The first thing we'd do when we got there was go out into the forest and cut down our Christmas tree. Now you have to realize that it's my grandpa and us 2 little girls that are going to cut this tree down and drag it back to the house. That's why I love Charlie Brown trees! It's almost always what our tree looked like! We'd pick some scraggly little thing and be so excited about it, "This one Pop! Let's get this one!" Pop would chop it down and we'd drag it home all proud of our selection! We'd get back and Maamaw would have her work cut out for her to make it beautiful. She'd put it up on a table and drape a pretty cloth around the bottom. Then we'd get to work stringing popcorn or cutting out construction paper chains. Whatever we had around the house to decorate the tree. We didn't go to the store to get our decorations we just looked around the house and made stuff! Sometimes Maamaw would cut out an article out of a magazine and say "Do you girls think you could make this?" "Of course!" we'd say..just find us some scissors and tape and maybe an old magazine.
Then we'd have little bitty presents to open each day before Christmas. Sometimes it was just a small Hallmark calendar that Maamaw had gotten for free. To us it was a wonderful new toy to play office or school! We'd spend hours inventing new games and plays with our new found treasures.
Then the baking would begin and Maamaw would make our favorite little individual pecan pies! We thought we were queens!
Then we'd go shopping at the Walmart to buy our presents for our parents. Maamaw would always direct us to something we could afford or something we could put both our money towards.
Then our parents would come up and we just could hardly wait for Christmas morning to come! We'd go to bed late and wake up every hour just waiting for it to be daybreak so we could wake every up! Then we could hardly stand it...we would decide that we'd waited long enough and head down the long hall to announce to everyone that Christmas has come! Wake up everyone! Everyone would drag out of bed all cock-eyed. But I knew they were excited too! We'd run down the long hall and into the dark living room with just the glow of Christmas lights from our scraggly tree. The cookies we'd left Santa were gone! Pop would go out to get wood for the fireplace. Even though most Christmases weren't cold at all in Texas...Pop would start a fire in the fireplace. It was Christmas after all!
Then the paper would start flying and the games would start playing! Pop would gather all the trash and feed the fire. You'd have to be careful the directions to your new game didn't get caught up in that fire!
So as we get closer to Christmas enjoy every minute of it! Make new memories. Keep the old. Tell your kids your Christmases past. They will love it...if not now then someday :)
Remember that the Saviour of the World came to seek and save the lost! That's us! Without Him there would be no hope!
