Christmas Memories

Originally published Dec. 12, 2012 11:00 a.m.

Many of us have all kinds of Christmas memories. Some of them are funny, some are heartwarming, and some may even be sad.

I have Christmas memories of all kinds, but most of them are great memories. There’s even a song by Alabama called “Christmas Memories” that seems to capture what many people reminisce about this time of year.

I remember the year my granddad got caught up in the Christmas spirit—if only briefly!  It hadn’t been long since he’d retired, so he had more free time on his hands than he was used to. He never really cared for decorating the Christmas tree or the house. In fact, sometimes we joke that he reminds of Scrooge. He really does love what Christmas is all about—celebrating the birth of Jesus. But he doesn’t care much for the shopping, the decorations, the numerous parties, etc. So when he brought home brand new Christmas decorations unexpectedly that one year, the family was dumbfounded! I can’t remember everything he bought, but I do remember strings of lights, a big outdoor light-up star, and a couple of tabletop light-up snowmen. We began to wonder if he was feeling alright, but he insisted he wanted to join in on the “Christmas spirit” that year. Some of those decorations still exist, but I have no idea what happened to the big star!

I remember the year our dog was sick. She’d been losing weight for a while, but we didn’t know how seriously ill she was. The day after Christmas, we had to have her put to sleep. That was sad, but only a couple of weeks later, we brought home a free puppy that turned out to be the center of attention in our house for years to come. She always had a stressed look on her face each time we brought down the Christmas decorations from the attic! I have a picture somewhere of her looking inquisitively at a string of lights on the floor as we were decorating the tree.

There was the year that my parents and I took a last-minute trip around New Year’s to Ohio to visit my great grandmother. She lived in a retirement home, and didn’t know we were coming. We wanted to surprise her. We spent part of two days with her, before driving back home. Although she seemed to be in good health then, we all seemed to know it would be the last time we saw her. She passed away the following November.  During our visit with her, we took her out to eat at Olive Garden. She ordered spaghetti. When asked how she liked it, she quipped, “It’s good, but not as good as mine!”

I’ll always remember going to my grandparents’ house on Christmas Day for breakfast and opening gifts around the tree. Their tree is much smaller than it used to be, but all of us enjoy meeting there each year to renew traditions. Often, we’ll have a time of prayer and each person will mention something they’re thankful for. Then, we dig into the food and before you know it, wrapping paper is airborne!

I remember as a young child, waking up on Christmas morning to find a half-empty glass of Coke on the kitchen table with Santa’s whiskers stuck all over the glass. Strangely, they had the texture of cotton!

I also remember a couple of years ago, I was planning to enjoy my first Christmas Day off from work in a few years, when the threat of snow caused me to go into work to do live weather updates.  It turned out there wasn’t that much snow after all, but it was a close call—close enough to wait another year to have Christmas Day off!

There are many more Christmas memories I could write about! What are some of your Christmas memories?