Christmas Anticipation!
I am sure we all have stories of our youth concerning the
anticipation of Christmas.
I remember my sister and me trying to hide under an end
table in our living room so we could see Santa.
Of course, Mom came and told us Santa knew we were still awake and was
not coming until we were asleep in our own beds. Drat, we thought we had it figured out; but moms
know their kids best. Remembering our
attempt to see Santa is probably why I enjoy the commercial with the children
all sitting on the couch with their headlights illuminating the fireplace. Did we not all want to catch Santa in the
act?
The most exciting stories of anticipation and suspense come
from my husband Michael. His family had
a wonderful tradition that made the expectancy almost too much to tolerate.
Two weeks before Christmas, Michael’s parents would close
off their living room. The house had
wonderful sliding pocket doors separating the dining room from the living room,
making it easy for them to block the access from the dining room. The living room also had a glass panel door with
a key lock separating it from the hall access.
The glass pane was covered on the inside to hide all the activity going
on behind.
To hear my husband talk of the expectation it was almost
more than a child could endure. The days
would slowly tick by as the boys lay on the floor trying to see under the door. Who was in the room? What were they doing? Was it Santa?
Was it his helping elves?
Joey, Michael, and Kevin had a truly exciting Christmas
morning. Finally, the three boys would
come down the steps, still in their PJs to find the hall door slightly ajar
showing ever-changing reflections from the fully lit Christmas tree just beyond
their vision. The boys would enter the
living room to see all the gifts displayed not wrapped. It was like walking into a wonderland of
toys. Being boys, they would find such
delights as forts with soldiers assembled and ready for enjoyment, or a
farmland fully displayed. On one
Christmas morning, it took Kevin nearly 15 minutes to spot the 10-speed Schwinn
bike behind the door the boys opened.
Marguerite, Michael’s mother was a master at decorating
and displaying. So naturally she would
have the Nativity scene displayed, and the stockings were there filled with even
more fascinating wonders. She would also
make exhibits of winter scenes. Like ice
skating figurines on a mirror with cotton laid out to look like snow on the
hillsides around a frozen pond.
I remember one display she gave me. She took a large round inflated balloon and
worked her magic. She soaked string in a
sugar and water solution, and then she would wrap the coated string around and
around the balloon until it took on the appearance of a white globe of lattice
string. Once it was dry, she would pop
the balloon, allowing the string to hold the form. Michael’s dad then cut a circle entrance to
the sphere and flattened one side to stop the sphere from rolling. Again using cotton and miniature figurines Marguerite
would build a display of a town square complete with a Christmas tree. It was a delight and so fascinating.
Her cost effective displays added to the wonder of
Christmas. Not to mention the 144 gross
of cookies she baked. Yes, that is 144 X
144….do the math. She would seal them in
decorative tins with tape to deter the boys from getting into the cookies. This would have worked if Michael and Kevin
had not gone out and purchased their own roll of tape.
Michael and his brothers must have enjoyed those
Christmases of their youth. I know that
I love hearing the stories of how their parents kept the wonder and spirit of
Christmas for everyone to enjoy.
I hope the parents of today are creating such magnificent
memories for their children. It doesn’t
have to cost a lot. It just needs to be
from the heart.
Merry Christmas to all and God Bless!
Jan
Jannie, you make all my own Christmas memories come avalanching back, as if they happened just yesterday!
ReplyDeleteMy birthday is on the 23rd, so in our small family (Mother, Daddy and me), we always celebrated the gift-giving of Christmas, and a big holiday dinner, on my birthday, complete with the obligatory chocolate-cake-with-7-minute-icing that would harden to the depth of an eggshell, with a marshmallow-y layer beneath. Then, on Christmas Eve, we'd pack the car with presents and luggage and take off upcountry Louisiana to my Daddy's sister's house, and we'd all go to Midnight Mass together.
This sister, my Aunt Mary, was married to a restauranteur who was a very good man. His "help"--fantastic Louisiana cooks--would cook and serve the Christmas dinner for the entire big Italian family--thirty to forty people--but at the same time, they'd be cooking their own luscious Christmas dinners as well, with all the trimmings (a free and lavish bonus from Uncle Sam.)
After we had finished our meal, the cooks would take home their hot, sumptuous dinners in restaurant casseroles and roasters, and all the family ladies would wash the dishes and pots and pans and clean the kitchen, while the men rearranged the tables and chairs into their usual one-table-four-chair configuration, ready for the next day's business--and we children played and danced and argued together. I always got to say Grace Before Meals, standing on a chair at the end of the long, long table(s). I think it was because I was the only one who knew it in English.
In our home, once I grew up and married, with our first six children born before the eldest was seven, we needed some way to keep the children from attacking the tree before we (who had been up until dawn wrapping, marking, and assembling toys) could even open an eye.
So what we did was to tell them they were on the Honor System. I would tape a piece of paper ribbon across the hall between their bedrooms and the living room, and they knew they were not to cross it until we got up--Honor was the keyword.
And for all the years we had children, even after we added fourteen more little ones to our family, NOT ONE CHILD EVER CROSSED THAT LINE!--(even though one year, when we lived in a home with stairs, Mark and Kippy held little Grettie's PJ pants by the back of the waist so she could hang out over the bannisters to try to read the labels on the toy packages!--she couldn't!)
But that little ribbon--and Honor-- kept them from ever crossing the line. Even on the Christmas when it was a few minutes after 12 when we finally woke up, our seventeen children sat there, patiently waiting for their parents to share their joy, rather than selfishly tearing into Christmas gifts on their own.
Knowing such good things about our children is part of our many lovely Christmas memories.
Jan, What a wonderful Christmas story. The anticipation was building in me as I read it. I can picture the delited faces of the boys as they invaded the room.
ReplyDeleteI on the other hand came from a large family with little money, but our Christmas was wonderful. If you like you can read about it at http://www.simplesite.com/Patricia-Salamone. It is always the best time of the year for me, and although I am no in my 70th. year I remember it well.