Quiet Holidays
For all of my young life, Christmas Holidays were so full of excitement and busyness! As a child I had the anticipation of gifts at Christmas, family parties that involved dozens of people, school and Sunday School pageants... sometimes with parts to memorize or songs to learn. As I got older there were gifts to buy or to make. I remember when I was in upper grade school, we lived in a bigger town, close to the town center, and my cousins and I would "go in together" and walk downtown to buy a bone china teacup for our grandma, to add to her collection. We also had gift exchanges with our extended families... we got to the point where there were so many that we "drew names" at Thanksgiving, so each family only had to buy as many gifts as they had family members. It was fun when I drew a cousin's name... not so much if it was an Uncle!
Like all families, it was a challenge to see both sides of the family at holiday time. We sort of got it worked out though... My Dad's sister loved having a Christmas Eve Party - so that was for Dad's side of the family. We would then spend Christmas Day with my Mom's family. Most of the time it worked out fine and everyone was happy.
My Aunt's Christmas Eve Party was on a level 'way above ours! My dad looked forward all year to having shrimp cocktail! We never had shrimp - it was to expensive! The table was loaded with food: appetizers before the meal, then a sit-down dinner, and desserts went on all evening! That is, in between all the other festivities. My eldest cousin played the piano and sang beautifully, so she lead carol singing. The tree was decorated beautifully.. well, so was the whole house. My Aunt had a thing for chatzkes! After carols were sung, we had gift opening time. Each person opened their gift, one at a time so everyone could see and exclaim. Ooooh and Aaaahhh. I can still see it in my minds eye, and even remember a couple of the gifts! There were usually 15-20 people at this celebration.
Driving home (I remember when we lived about 25 miles away), we would watch the sky, looking for Santa's sleigh and admiring any houses with lighted displays. Too excited to sleep in the car! When we got home, we were allowed to open one specific gift, and it was always pajamas, and sometimes a robe and slippers.
Christmas morning in our home was as busy as any other. Kids sneaking down the stairs before the designated time, "just checking" to see if Santa had been. My brother was a terrible sneak! and finally being allowed to go into the Living Room and tear into the gifts. One person was designated "Santa" to pass out all the gifts. When everyone had all of their presents in a pile in front of them, it was TIME! We didn't ever get THE toy that was popular on TV advertising that year, but we always got several toys or games and some clothing... often made by my Mom, especially for me. Girls are easier to sew for than boys! As I got older I knew that we were not rich... but I never realized just how poor we were because we always had enough.... enough food, enough heat, enough to pay bills, and enough to get presents at Christmas, even if they were not what we saw on TV. That was one of my parents greatest gifts to us... to always have enough. Years later, I heard stories from my dad about how he came to get some of our presents.... he would go out on Christmas Eve day to do his shopping and sometimes got the best deals! That is how he got my brother's Radio Flyer wagon, and the cute chairs to make a tea set for me with a table we already had.
When I got married, everything changed, of course. My husband's family lived hours away from mine, so it just wasn't reasonable to try to visit both. It worked out quite well though, as my sister-in-law wanted to travel home on Thanksgiving, so we spent that holiday with his family, and Christmas with mine. We would often then go to his folk's for New Year's. We never had any real issues because it was worked out for us right from the start. I sometimes felt bad for my mother-in-law as she was alone after our first son was born and my father-in-law passed that same year. But she did have sisters who were also alone, so they spent the day together.
We never lived in the same town as either of our parents, and for many years lived a good day's drive away. We could never be sure if the weather would cooperate and allow us to come and go when we wanted, but we did our best and almost always made it home during the Holiday week, if not for Christmas Day. There were a couple of years when the weather was too bad to travel, and we were alone in South Dakota. That started us learning how to celebrate on a different scale. It certainly felt odd, but now that there are just 2 or maybe 3 of us, it is really different!
This year was nice and quiet. DS the Younger got home in the early afternoon of Christmas Eve. I don't even remember what we had for dinner that night, but we did all go to church together at 7pm, and I remember that timing put a dent in our dinner plans. I think we had Beef Burgundy when we got home after service! We decided not to do gifts this year, but I had already bought a few, so we still had a present or two to open on Christmas morning. We put our emphasis on nice things to eat, and DS the Younger and I always enjoy cooking together. I did do some decorating, so we had a tree. I played some Christmas music, and I think we read.... we often play a game or work a jigsaw puzzle.
I DIDN'T SAVE ANY PHOTOS!
Here, I found ONE on Instagram... can't copy and paste.... Lesson Learned....I need to be more timely in my posts...
Pic of Christmas decorations
I do know that I worked on making a muslin for DS the Younger's shirt, so that I could get it fitted while he was home. All in all, it was pleasant, if not the fun-filled Holiday like we had in the past.
I'm not sure, but I think I enjoyed it just as much, if not more.
Like all families, it was a challenge to see both sides of the family at holiday time. We sort of got it worked out though... My Dad's sister loved having a Christmas Eve Party - so that was for Dad's side of the family. We would then spend Christmas Day with my Mom's family. Most of the time it worked out fine and everyone was happy.
My Aunt's Christmas Eve Party was on a level 'way above ours! My dad looked forward all year to having shrimp cocktail! We never had shrimp - it was to expensive! The table was loaded with food: appetizers before the meal, then a sit-down dinner, and desserts went on all evening! That is, in between all the other festivities. My eldest cousin played the piano and sang beautifully, so she lead carol singing. The tree was decorated beautifully.. well, so was the whole house. My Aunt had a thing for chatzkes! After carols were sung, we had gift opening time. Each person opened their gift, one at a time so everyone could see and exclaim. Ooooh and Aaaahhh. I can still see it in my minds eye, and even remember a couple of the gifts! There were usually 15-20 people at this celebration.
Driving home (I remember when we lived about 25 miles away), we would watch the sky, looking for Santa's sleigh and admiring any houses with lighted displays. Too excited to sleep in the car! When we got home, we were allowed to open one specific gift, and it was always pajamas, and sometimes a robe and slippers.
Christmas morning in our home was as busy as any other. Kids sneaking down the stairs before the designated time, "just checking" to see if Santa had been. My brother was a terrible sneak! and finally being allowed to go into the Living Room and tear into the gifts. One person was designated "Santa" to pass out all the gifts. When everyone had all of their presents in a pile in front of them, it was TIME! We didn't ever get THE toy that was popular on TV advertising that year, but we always got several toys or games and some clothing... often made by my Mom, especially for me. Girls are easier to sew for than boys! As I got older I knew that we were not rich... but I never realized just how poor we were because we always had enough.... enough food, enough heat, enough to pay bills, and enough to get presents at Christmas, even if they were not what we saw on TV. That was one of my parents greatest gifts to us... to always have enough. Years later, I heard stories from my dad about how he came to get some of our presents.... he would go out on Christmas Eve day to do his shopping and sometimes got the best deals! That is how he got my brother's Radio Flyer wagon, and the cute chairs to make a tea set for me with a table we already had.
When I got married, everything changed, of course. My husband's family lived hours away from mine, so it just wasn't reasonable to try to visit both. It worked out quite well though, as my sister-in-law wanted to travel home on Thanksgiving, so we spent that holiday with his family, and Christmas with mine. We would often then go to his folk's for New Year's. We never had any real issues because it was worked out for us right from the start. I sometimes felt bad for my mother-in-law as she was alone after our first son was born and my father-in-law passed that same year. But she did have sisters who were also alone, so they spent the day together.
We never lived in the same town as either of our parents, and for many years lived a good day's drive away. We could never be sure if the weather would cooperate and allow us to come and go when we wanted, but we did our best and almost always made it home during the Holiday week, if not for Christmas Day. There were a couple of years when the weather was too bad to travel, and we were alone in South Dakota. That started us learning how to celebrate on a different scale. It certainly felt odd, but now that there are just 2 or maybe 3 of us, it is really different!
This year was nice and quiet. DS the Younger got home in the early afternoon of Christmas Eve. I don't even remember what we had for dinner that night, but we did all go to church together at 7pm, and I remember that timing put a dent in our dinner plans. I think we had Beef Burgundy when we got home after service! We decided not to do gifts this year, but I had already bought a few, so we still had a present or two to open on Christmas morning. We put our emphasis on nice things to eat, and DS the Younger and I always enjoy cooking together. I did do some decorating, so we had a tree. I played some Christmas music, and I think we read.... we often play a game or work a jigsaw puzzle.
I DIDN'T SAVE ANY PHOTOS!
Here, I found ONE on Instagram... can't copy and paste.... Lesson Learned....I need to be more timely in my posts...
Pic of Christmas decorations
I do know that I worked on making a muslin for DS the Younger's shirt, so that I could get it fitted while he was home. All in all, it was pleasant, if not the fun-filled Holiday like we had in the past.
I'm not sure, but I think I enjoyed it just as much, if not more.
Comments
Post a Comment