Christmas memories

[Sarah]

Mine are far simpler, but my fondest memories were of the Christmas tree farm out by Pratt that we always went to.  Walking around looking for that perfect tree to cut down and then laying on the couch staring at all the pretty lights.

I do remember one Christmas in particular when I woke up and there was a brand new English saddle under the tree.  That was an awesome Christmas.

[pamsback]

.......I been thinkin about this....all my Christmas memories are good ones...even the years when someone had just passed away because we still included them and didn't try to act like nothin had happened..........listenin to Moms Christmas music records......watchin Rudolph out to granma and grampa Smiths..........Christmas eve there, Christmas day at home, the weekend at Poppy and granma Gerties and all the cousins from Moms side to play with, Aunt Sherries funny pages wrappin paper  , Mom and Dad always managed to get us one thing we really wanted.....two that I remember the most is the year there was a microscope under the tree and the year a pair of Tony Lama boots was under it....maybe I have selective memory..I don't know but Christmas has always been a good time of family and friends for me. It still is!

[Wilma]

  Santa is back.

Are you ready for another one?

When I was three years old, Santa Claus decided to mail our presents to us because he didn't think he could find us that year.  So on the day that the package came in the mail, I was with Mother when she got it at the mail box.  On the way back to the house, she decided that maybe Santa wouldn't mind if we just peeked at my present.  So there, in the middle of the driveway, halfway to the house, she opened the package enough for me to see the set of toy tin dishes that Santa had brought me.  Now this memory doesn't end there.

Later, maybe a few days after Christmas or maybe weeks after, my father made me a toy cupboard to keep my dishes in.  I watched him work with his hand tools, a saw, hammer and plane as he put together a wooden cupboard, just big enough to hold my new dishes.  He must have salvaged a packing case of some kind as there was writing of some kind on it and a couple of the shelves have small declivities that might have been hand holds for the original case.  I say have small declivities as they are still there in the little toy cuplboard that my father made for me and that is now stored on a closet shelf.  As to the dishes, I think all the flat ones went down the cracks in the living room floor, put there by my little brother when he got big enough to crawl.  I still haven't forgiven him.

[Warph]

Go for it!  I bet there will be some more interesting stories such as yours.

Larryj

Ah... Christmas memories.  I posted this last year so I'll share it again.

As a joke, my son Gary, used to hang a pair of panty hose over the fireplace before Christmas.  He said all he wanted was for Santa to fill them.  What they say about Santa checking the list twice must be true because every Christmas morning, although the kids' stockings were overflowed, his poor pantyhose hung sadly empty.

One year I decided to make his dream come true.  I put on sunglasses and  went in search of an inflatable love doll.  They don't sell those things  at Walmart, you know.  I had to go to an adult bookstore downtown.  If you've never been in an X-rated store, don't go.  You'll only confuse yourself.  I was there an hour saying things like, "What does this do?" "You're kidding me!" and  "Who would buy that?"

Finally, I made it to the inflatable doll section.  I wanted to buy a standard, uncomplicated doll that could also substitute as a passenger in my suv so I could use the car pool lane during rush hour.

Finding what I wanted was difficult.  Love dolls come in many different models.  The top of the line, according to the side of the box, could do things I'd only seen in a book on animal husbandry.  I settled for 'Lovable Louise.'  She was at the bottom of the price scale.  To call Louise a "doll" took a huge leap of imagination.

On Christmas Eve, with the help of an old bicycle pump, Louise came to life.  I crept down long after Santa had come and gone, I filled the dangling pantyhose with Louise's pliant legs and bottom.  I also ate some cookies and drank what remained of a glass of Jack Daniels Black (Santa's favorite) on a nearby tray.  I went back to bed and cracked up laughing for a couple of hours.

The next morning, Gary was astatic to say the least that Santa had left a present that had made him VERY happy but had left our dog, Maggie, confused.  She would bark, start to walk away, then come back and bark some more.  We (the family) all agreed that Louise should remain in her panty hose so the rest of the family could admire her when they came over for the traditional Christmas dinner.

Gary's grandmother noticed "Louise" the moment she walked in the door.

"What the hell is that?" she asked.  Gary quickly explained, "It's a doll."

"Who would play with something like that?," Granny snapped.  I had several candidates in mind, but kept my mouth shut.  

"Where are her clothes?" Granny continued.  

"Boy, that turkey sure smells good, Gran," Gary said , trying to steer her into the dining room.  But Granny was relentless.  

"Why doesn't she have any teeth?"  Again, I could have answered, but why would I?  It was Christmas and no one wanted to ride in the back of the ambulance saying,  "Hang on, Granny!  Hang on!"

Gary's grandfather, a delightful old man with poor eyesight, sidled up to me and said, " Hey Bub, who's the naked gal by the fireplace?"  I told him she was Gary's friend.  A few minutes later I noticed Grandpa by the mantel, talking to Louise.  Not just talking, but actually flirting.  It was then that I realized this might be Grandpa's last Christmas at home.

The dinner went well.  We made the usual small talk about who had died, who was dying, and who should be killed, when suddenly Louise made a noise that sounded a lot like my father in the bathroom in the morning.  Then she lurched from the panty hose, flew around the room twice, and fell in a heap in front of the sofa.  The dog screamed.  I passed cranberry sauce through my nose, and Grandpa ran across the room, fell to his knees, and began administering mouth to mouth resuscitation.  Gary fell back over his chair and wet his pants and Granny threw down her napkin, stomped out of the room, and sat in the car.

It was indeed a Christmas to treasure and remember.

Later in the garage, we conducted a thorough examination to decided the cause of Louise's collapse.  We discovered that Louise had suffered from a hot ember to the back of her right thigh.  Fortunately, thanks to a wonder drug called duct tape, we restored her to perfect health.

Louise went on to star in several bachelor party movies.

I think Grandpa still calls her whenever he can get out of the house.

Now... if you believe that Christmas memory,  I might have another one....    that took place at Christmas a few years ago.  I was walking through this strange forest area when, suddenly..... I fell down this giant rabbit hole.....    

[larryJ]

Ha! Ha! Ha!  Just too too funny!  I don't know where you got that from, but it just too good.

And, in the next story you hinted at, just remember----------------You are not in Kansas anymore, Toto.

Larryj

[Wilma]

Warph--walking through a strange forest area?--unbelievable.

How many of you remember your first real tree?  By real tree I mean a live one that you bought or cut.  Now I know that most of you who grew up around here where real Christmas trees are plentiful can't remember anything else.  I grew up in Sedgwick County where you did not cut a tree of any kind that did not belong to you and the pastures and waysides were not full of the beautiful red cedars that are so plentiful here.

We never had a real Christmas tree until I was seven years old.  My mother would trim some branches from an evergreen or if an evergreen were not available, ordinary tree branches would do.  We decorated with home made decorations and one year we had some of the red and green rope that was made from tissue paper.  I doubt if you even know what I am talking about.  Anyway, when I was seven years old Daddy started working on the construction of Lake Afton, so in early November we moved to a small town closer to his work.  Soon after we moved, I had appendicitis and didn't go back to school until after Christmas.  Came time for the school Christmas parties and since I was still home, my teacher brought me a planter of paper narcissus that she had planted and were just beginning to bloom.  Now comes the tree.  Back at the old school house, my brother's teacher asked if there was anyone who didn't have a tree yet.  Mother hadn't had the time to do a makeshift tree, so my brother said that we didn't have one.  Seems that someone else didn't have a tree either, so they drew for the school room tree. My brother won.  Here he came carrying a real live Christmas tree.  In my eyes it was beautiful.    It stood on the floor like a tree should and it even had some tinsel still on it.  We had to make more decorations for it, but my mother always made everything as much fun as possible.  She never let us think that we had less than anyone else.  I don't remember what my present from Santa Claus was that year, but I remember the flowers my teacher brought me and the real live tree that my brother brought home.

[Diane Amberg]

I do remember my first tree. Daddy got it a tree lot under the railroad overpass in Wilmington. We were still living in an apartment then. Unfortunately for the tree I walked at 9 months, so of course by 11 months I was zooming around and pulled the tree over. Broke a few balls. My parents secured the tree better after that!

[Mom70x7]

This cardboard creche is from my Mom's family. When we were kids, we were allowed to put the pieces in place, one at at time. Jim and I continued the tradition with our kids for awhile - they had to explain or tell a story about each individual piece.

[twirldoggy]

The time was in the early 1950's.  My parents John and Martha Jeanne traveled with three of their children to Hewins Kansas to visit Uncle Jimmy and Aunt Joye.  Both parents had family roots in Hewins.  The children in town were meeting in the little wood frame school house for a visit from Santa.  We were included in the group.  Santa came dressed exactly as we thought, in a beautiful red suit, black boots and he had a real white beard. The room was very quiet.  Kids were not sure what to expect. He was carrying a sack of little bags of homemade candy.  He gave each child a sack of candy. A wonderful memory as we were from the big city of Albuquerque and nothing like that would happen there.

[Wilma]

This memory is much more recent than the ones I have posted so far.  It was 1979.  We had moved from an eight room house to a 12X60 trailer house.  Needless to say, a lot of our furniture was stored in various places.  I knew where the Christmas tree was so it wasn't hard to find.  It wasn't hard to put up even though I think this was the first time I had done it alone.  One of the girls had always been handy to help, but we had left them in Elk County.  I used all the usual lights and ornaments.  I don't remember what topped the tree.  Still, when I was finished, there was something missing.  One of those things that you can't quite remember, but definitely the tree didn't seem complete.  Then in came Goldie.  Goldie was a six month old kitten, the only cat allowed in the house at that time.  She was being babied because the pup had wallowed her in the ice and mud one day and we had to bring her in to clean up and dry her off.  She took one look at the tree, the first one she had ever seen, marched right over to it and knocked off an ornament.  My tree was complete.  The only thing it needed was a kitten.

I don't remember anything else about Christmas in 1979.