Three F’s

For as long as I can remember, Grandmother and Granddad had their family over for Christmas Eve. We’d eat homemade candy, desserts and goodies and open the gift the G’s had for us. Then we’d watch while they open our gifts.

After they were gone, that tradition had to change. It was decided that we’d combine the office Christmas party and the family party. Since much of the family is part of the business, that makes a lot of sense.

This year, we got together again. And, no surprise, we had a great time. (At least I did.)

 This is the pair who does all the planning and worrying, and they send out the invitations. (And we haven’t been disappointed yet!)

The food is always DELICIOUS. (And we’ve been a bunch of places over the years.)

And this was to keep us from starving BEFORE we got our steaks. (Talk about yum!)

 We get to visit with people we love and don’t get to see often enough. And we get to wear our Christmas sweaters. There’s never enough Christmas sweater time.

Everybody who possibly can makes it a point to be there.

Young , , ,

And not quite as young. (Except at heart.)

We have fun

Fun!

 FUN!

Food, Fun and Family. What could be better than that?

Christmas Leftovers

I hope your Christmas was everything you dreamed it would be. Mine absolutely was. All my children were home, together, at the same time. All their spouses and spouses-to-be were here. No one cried except me, and it was the good kind of crying.

And I got to see my Dad and all my sibs except #4. I heard from her, though, so the day was p-e-r-f-e-c-t!!!

I had a couple of Christmas memories I didn’t get a chance to share with you before the big day, so I thought I’d shake them out now.

Christmas trees growing up were always cedar trees. The kind that grow like weeds in this part of the world and the government will pay you to get rid of. But as kids, we didn’t know that. We thought they were beautiful.

Besides the fact they poked you if you got too close, lost their needles (I’m not sure what a cedar has in place of leaves, but I’m calling it needles) if you looked at it too hard, and couldn’t hold up an ornament that weighed more than about three ounces (spun glass and tinsel, anyone?) what’s not to love?

After all, they were green and smelled kind of wintery-outdoorsy for about a minute and a half.

So every year, Dad and Granddad would cut several cedar trees for our houses and a few of the neighbors. I always thought they were so kind to share the trees off our land with other people, and at no charge!

When I was about ten or twelve, I found out the really good part was going out to cut the trees. We’d bundle up, pile into a pickup or station wagon, drive out to the farm and walk through the woods until we came to the “perfect” tree.

The first time Dad handed me the axe, I was so surprised, I nearly dropped it. But I stepped right up and chopped that tree right down. I haven’t cut one in years, but it seems like they were very easy to cut down. I think he let #2 cut down the next tree that day.

We never did cut the bottom off and stick it in water so it wouldn’t dry out, like they say you should do if you want your tree to stay “fresh”. We put them in water, and if they wouldn’t drink we figured they weren’t thirsty.

The worst part was undecorating the tree and getting it out of the house when the holiday was over. Not only was the tree scratchy, it kind of exploded when you moved it. Remember in Christmas Story when they go to buy their tree and one leaves a perfect ring of needles?

That’s the way our cedar trees defoliated themselves after weeks in a house with dry air. Rub past it. Thrum! Bump the wall with it. Bam! Shove it through the door. Kaboom!

Clouds of dry cedar needles. They burn well, too.

Other happy (now, anyway) and favorite Christmas memories:

• The year #4 put “makeup” on Sister Debbie’s brand new doll with an indelible ink pen.
• Finding gifts months after Christmas that were hidden in Grandmother’s closet and forgotten by Santa.
• The year Mom’s beautiful bracelet (from a jewelry store!) disappeared from under the tree. When we couldn’t find it, Mama asked #4 if she knew where it was. Oh, yeah! She’d hidden it in the ice cream freezer. Upside down, smashing the bow.
• Every Christmas, dressing like Mom and my sisters in velvet dresses that Mama made. Sometimes Brother Jeffrey got a matching vest or jacket. For some reason, Dad never sported velvet. (Not that we minded.)
• When my kids were one, three and almost eight and they took turns opening presents so they could fight over every gift. (Mostly the one and three-year-old really picked on the eight-year-old.)
• Hanging of the Greens.
• All the Family Christmas Eves at Grandmother’s house.
• Knowing the real Santa Claus (because he knew my boys by sight.)
• My parents living out the true meaning of Christmas.
• Knowing the One whose birthday we’ve celebrated for over two thousand years. (No, I don’t remember quite all those years.)

Merry CHRISTmas

Taking a minute from the merriment this morning (Biscuits, gravy, gifts and kids. Can you think of anything merrier than that?) to wish all y’all a very merry Christmas. I hope all your wishes come true, your loved ones make it safely home and you have the happiest Christ-centered Christmas ever.

http://youtu.be/Vnt7euRF5Pg

Take a moment if you can and watch Youtube video above. Even if you’ve seen the Flash Carolers before (my name for them) watch them again. Let them bless your heart and start your Christmas right.

And because this is the last time I can share it this year (maybe) I hope you’ll listen to BREATH OF HEAVEN, below.

http://youtu.be/iCyxi6E0DUg

Merry Christmas, EVERYONE.

Celebrating the Reason for the Season all year ’round!

Happy Christmas Eve!

I receieved this from #4 yesterday morning and wanted to share with you. A woman was out Christmas shopping with her two children. After many hours of looking at row after row of toys and everything else imaginable, and after hours of hearing both her children asking for everything they saw on those many shelves, she finally made it to the elevator with her two kids. She was feeling what so many of us feel during the holiday season time of the   year—overwhelming pressure to go to every party, every housewarming, taste all the holiday food and treats, get that perfect gift for every single person on our shopping list, make sure we don’t forget anyone on our card list, and the pressure of making sure we respond to everyone who sent us a card. Finally the elevator doors opened and there was already a crowd in the car. She pushed her way into the car and dragged her two kids in with her and all the bags of stuff. When the doors closed she couldn’t take it anymore and stated, “Whoever started this whole Christmas thing should be found, strung up and shot.” From the back of the car everyone heard a quiet, calm voice respond, “Don’t worry. We already crucified him.”     For the rest of the trip down the elevator it was so quiet you could have heard a pin drop. Don’t forget this year to keep the One who started this whole Christmas thing in your every thought, deed, purchase, and word. If we all did it, just think how different this whole world would be. Celebrating The Reason For The Season, all year ’round!

Getting Christmas Ready

For me, watching the season’s movies is a big part of getting in the mood for Christmas.

I love the old ones as well if not better than the new ones. Not sure the guys in my family like them, but it’s only once a year. They survive.

It’s hard to pick my absolute favorite, but the movie that puts the biggest grin on my face is “A Christmas Story”.

It’s the cute story of a little boy who wants a BB gun for Christmas. No matter who he tells he wants one, he gets the same response. “You’ll shoot your eye out.”

That movie was introduced to my crew by Sister Debbie’s family. Their son, Kyle, and Ralphie looked amazingly alike. Kyle would grin real big and say, “ a Red Ryder BB Gun with a compass in the stock, and this thing which tells time”.

http://youtu.be/ppOXpyhM2wA

Even though the movie is funny and stars my nephew’s look alike, I enjoy it most for another reason. It’s set in the ’40′s or early ’50′s, when the world was such a nice place to live.

The Christmas parade has a housetop complete with a chimney for Santa to ride in. Kids look in store windows and stand in line for a long time to sit on the Big Guy’s lap.

And parents aren’t worried sick while their kids are away from them. Don’t you love movies like that?

Some of my other favorite Christmas movies are “A Wonderful Life” (of course, isn’t it everyone’s?) “A Season for Miracles”

Cover of Season for Miracles

and “One Magic Christmas.”

If you haven’t seen “A Season for Miracles,” you should. It’s a Hallmark Hall of Fame movie, which is a recommendation in itself, and the story was written by my friend Marilyn Pappano.

You can read it and/or watch it. (The movie is great but the book is even better!)

There are so many wonderful movies out there for the Season. One I never hear anyone talk about but I love is called, “Remember the Night.”

I borrowed this from IMDb–

Just before Christmas, Lee Leander is caught shoplifting. It is her third offense. She is prosecuted by John Sargent. He gets the trial postponed because it is hard to get a conviction at Christmastime. But he feels sorry for her and arranges for her bail, and ends up taking her home to his mother for Christmas. Surrounded by a loving family (in stark contrast to Lee’s own family background) they fall in love. This creates a new problem: how do they handle the upcoming trial? Written by John Oswalt <jao@jao.com>

If you get the chance (and I hope you do) give “Remember the Night” a chance. It’s a wonderful slow-down-and-enjoy-the-season movie.

So many good movies, so little time!

Of course, my favorite part of Christmas is time with my family and friends.

I hope God blesses you with tons of happy memories of happy time spent with your loved ones this Christmas.

Merry CHRISTmas!

Ps: What’s your favorite Season’s movie?

Christmas in Heaven

I started to repost this on Facebook yesterday. At Christmas, I like remembering friends and loved ones who’ve passed.

But when I really looked at that picture and read the words, it sounds almost as if my loved ones were gone. Over.

That’s not true. Those who’ve gone on are in HEAVEN! (No doubt about that.) They’re with the Jesus, face to face!

Can you imagine the celebration There when it’s Jesus’s birthday? The joy, happiness, the atmosphere of pure love that happens when they celebrate The Day He came to save us from our sins?

Try to imagine the colors. The songs. The absolute explosion of joy that inundates everyone during the celebration?

Christmas was Mom’s favorite holiday. She loved it, worked toward it, made it so special for me, my siblings and my kids, I could never duplicate it.

Nope. I can’t just light a candle to remember her at Christmas. I’d have to set off an entire pyrotechnic display!

Hole-In-The-Wall Gang

Do you have favorite Christmas memories you revisit every year? I do. And I like to pretend I’m normal, so I think you probably do, too.

Sometimes the ones that give us the biggest smiles are the ones that were so awful at the time. Such as when we got the new wagon from Santa.

I don’t remember if it was a Spess Kids present or specifically Brother Jeffrey’s gift. (We never paid a lot of attention to that kind of thing–share and share alike is what Mama enforced.) I remember all five of us getting in that wagon so Dad could take a picture.

The wagon wasn’t red like a normal wagon. It was blue or aqua. And we couldn’t play with it in the street, of course, so we were instructed we’d have to keep it on the sidewalks and driveways when cars weren’t parked there. Since Grandmother and Granddad lived next door and we had a connecting sidewalk, that wasn’t such a bad deal.

Anyway, it was a cold Christmas Day and all our aunts, uncles and cousins were at Grandmother’s for Christmas dinner. With a crowd that size Dad had two brothers and one sister, two of which had four kids at that time, and while one had five. With Dad’s five-at-that-time, you get a number close to thirty, which it a little crowded, no matter how big the kitchen and living room is.

So when we asked Mom if it was okay to go next door to our house and play, she let us go. We showed off our loot and played with it for a little while. I went to do something else, and when I came back, Sister Debbie and Joanie were taking turns, pushing each other through the house in the wagon. One pushed, one rode and steered, then they swapped places.

They had a great time because we had a huge living room with a wood floor–an excellent runway for the blue missile. You had to do some quick stepping if you started through the living room at the wrong time!

Whenever Joanie did something, she went at it hard, and pushing the wagon that day was no exception. She pushed it right into the wall.

Of course, it went through the sheet rock and left a hole the size of a grapefruit, which was not a pretty sight. So Sister Debbie and Joanie decided to hide it. They shoved the big, brown chair up against that wall, and rushed back to Grandmother’s to play.

Since I wasn’t part of the hole-in-the-wall-gang, I didn’t feel it was my place to rat them out, but my stomach hurt the rest of the afternoon because of it.

Now we had a sharp pair of parents, who didn’t miss much. When the family left Grandmother’s and Mom and Dad came home, they immediately noticed the chair in the wrong place.

Mom shoved it back where it belonged. I can hear her now. “Oh, my stars! What happened to the wall?”

Sister Debbie didn’t get spanked, if I remember right, but Dad could make you feel awful when he scolded you. “Your mom works so hard, keeping this house nice. Now you’ve made a hole right inside the front door. It looks awful. Do you know–?”

The wagon was moved outside and never came back in again.

So, what Christmas memories do you enjoy? Want to share one or two?

Ps: Deb–feel free to correct any mistake I made in this telling.

Memories Tree

Know what this is?

How about now?

I know. This will help.

 How about this?

If you’re thinking it’s a glove, you’d be only half right. It’s also an . . .

 Are you ready for it?

ornament!

I finally decorated my 2nd tree last night. And, yes, I add the gloves every year. It started once when we bought some antique ornaments in Eureka Springs. I put them on the big tree in our living room, but it looked a little bare. I didn’t want to put new ornaments on it, so I added Grandmother’s old gloves.

 I love the way they look, dangling there. And since I have some of Grandmother’s ornaments on the tree

such as the sputnik at the bottom of this picture

and this satellite, I figure they belong there. Their shapes tell you their birthdates–the fifties.

Here are a few more of my favorite old ornaments–

Mama had an ornament like this when I was a kid. My secret tradition was for me to put it on the tree.

My Joanie ornament.

The year Joanie and I lived together, we had a tiny cedar Christmas tree that Dad cut for us. This ornament is like the ones we had on that tree.

 And this is just a cool old ornament.

All my old ornaments aren’t family hand-me-downs; some are just pretty. Or interesting. So if you see some orphaned ones on the loose somewhere, let me know. I’ll give them a good home!

This is under my Grandmother tree.

 It’s a tree skirt.

Mom and I were at market in Dallas, and she had me order this one for Grandmother and one with a red background for her house. (I think Brother Jeffrey has the red one under his tree.)

The back of it is Christmas red, and in one corner it says, “1991; To Ruby from Carol and Mary Sue. Happy Mother’s Day.”

Check out last year’s post, THE GRANDMOTHER TREE.

Christmas Week

One week until Christmas. This morning I’m going to stop worrying about gifts and trees and other temporary things for a little while and consider the Reason for the Season. Jesus.

I have Luke 2:11-12 on a sticky note, which keeps it at the top of my blogs until I take it down. (It’s there because #4 and I are memorizing it for our final SSMT of the year.)

Yesterday I heard a man talking about how the shepherds, who were first to hear the Good News, and when they did, they RAN  to find Him.

I don’t know what else the man had to say because my mind took off. Maybe it’s the writer in me, but I couldn’t keep from thinking about it in the angels’ point of view.

Imagine, being in Heaven when the announcement was ready to be made. Today, God has become a man!!! He is Christ, the Saviour. Were the angels all excited? Did they all want to get to announce the news?

Can’t you see them, all standing on tiptoe, hoping Yahweh will choose them to give the announcement that Christ, the Saviour, has been born?

Finally, one gets the job, and gives the word to the shepherds.

“Do not be afraid. I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people. ¹¹ Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord. ¹² This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.”

But the rest of the angels can’t stand it. They have to sing out their joy.

Glory to God in the highest! And on earth peace to men on whom his favor rests.

Next my  brain switches to the Shepherds’ POV. (Point of View)

There they are with the sheep all bedded down for the night. They’re chatting as they do every evening before the graveyard shift starts. Some are getting ready to sleep while the rest are getting ready to stroll around the perimeter or sing to the sheep.

Out of nowhere, a being appears who is unmistakably an angel. The shepherds don’t question that it was an angel.

 The glory of the Lord shone around them and they were terrified!

When they see the angel, I imagine they all froze.

“Behold!” (NIV says, Be not afraid, but I like, BEHOLD!!!)

Don’t you imagine all the shepherd’s crooks hit the ground?

“I bring you good tidings of great joy that will be for all people.”

When the angel who brought the news finishes the announcement, as if to prove to the shepherd they hadn’t imagined the single angel, a whole flock of angels appear.

“Glory to God in the highest! And on earth peace to men on whom his favor rests.”

When the angels were gone and the sky was black again, the shepherds ran to find the Christ Child.

When they had seen him, they spread the word concerning what had been told them about this child, ¹⁸ and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds said to them.

Okay, maybe that’s why God decided to tell the shepherds first, because He knew they would spread the word.

Now can you put yourself in Mary’s place? She’s a young girl, a virgin, who has traveled far from her home with the man she’s going to marry. I think I read someplace that it took them about a week to travel to Bethlehem.

The last week before my first child was born, Mom made me stop driving a few blocks to work at Four Seasons, our dress shop. (I think she was afraid I’d slip and fall in the snow and have him on Broadway.)

Mary either walked or rode a donkey for most of that week as she traveled to Bethlehem.

The night before my first son was born, I wasn’t comfortable any place–walking, sitting or lying down. I went to a basket ball game, but couldn’t stay too long because #1 son’s feet were in my ribs.

Try to imagine the exhausted girl, Mary, and Joseph as they tried to find a place for her to rest. When the pains started, had they found the stable? Or did the man who owned the inn see that she was in labor and send them to the barn after he heard her cries?

Was Mary frightened as she had God’s son? I doubt that He took away the pain of childbirth. When her body worked to expel Christ, Creator of the Universe, and the only person with her was a man who’d never been married or delivered a child while a barn full of animals looked on, was she surprised or taken aback?

I was when my body took over, even though I’d read the books and gone through the classes.

¹⁹ But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart.

²⁰ The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things they had heard and seen, which were just as they had been told.

Ready for True Christmas? I am. I want to celebrate The Reason for The Season all year ’round.

How about you?

Wishing you and your family a wonderful faith filled Christmas.

 

Old Ford Christmas Story

Dad has a favorite story he tells nearly every Christmas. I’ve heard it twice this year, and love it! I hope he tells it another time or two before the season is over.

My dad grew up in Old Ford and he lives there today. (Nearly all his kids moved back to C-Town, and he packed up and moved away. LOL)

When he was in grade school one year during the depression, I believe he said third grade, they drew names for their Christmas party.

Dad said he drew a girl’s name, and he was not thrilled. The teacher told them they couldn’t spend more than a quarter on the present, but they needed to bring it to the class Christmas party.

So Grandmother gave him a quarter and sent him to Old Ford’s Mercantile. (This was back in the day when it was safe to send your eight year old to the store all alone.)

Now the Mercantile was an interesting place. If I remember right, he said the Mercantile was built around the bank. Imagine a huge store with one corner taken up with another business–the bank. There was an entrance on the south and one on the east (main street). One side had groceries and one side had hardware and housewares, etc.

So Dad looked and looked and looked, trying to decide what to give the little girl. A little girl didn’t play with a top or a yo-yo back then. What should he get her?

Finally, he decided on a vase. Yes, you read that right. A fifteen cent vase for an eight-year-old girl. I always laugh out loud when he gets to that part.

The Vase! (Thanks Sister Cindy.)

He usually talks about how this little girl was polite when she opened the present, but he didn’t remember any squeals of joy when she opened it.

Now fast forward thirty for forty years. He walks into Sister Cindy’s house one day, and on her shelf sits . . . The Vase. He couldn’t believe his eyes. How in the world did Cindy get it?

Looking back over the years, he always figured the little girl had thrown it away or at least broken it. (Or maybe taken it back and traded it for a doll.)

“Where did you get this?”

“Bruce’s mother gave it to me.” Cindy answered. ”She got it–”

“In third grade at the class Christmas party,” Dad finished for her. “I gave it to her.”

“Really?” Cindy was surprised. “She thought Don Holmes gave it to her.”

That makes me laugh, too, although I’ve never known Mr. Holmes. (There’s another funny story there, but I’ll save it for another time.)

So you never really know how much your gift is going to mean to a person. Or if they’ll learn to like it more as the years go by.

Funny thing is, if I’d given that little boy advice, I would have suggested a necklace or music box. Never in a thousand years would I suggest a vase. But she probably would have a necklace after all these years.

And I wouldn’t get to tell share Dad’s story.