Memories

So I read a nice article in Reader's Digest about writing your memoirs. Which is not the same as your biography. Memoirs are memories, they are nice and short. So today I'm writing 2 Christmas Memories. One sad-ish, one funny.


My husband had been dead 6 months. It was the first Christmas without him. Thanks to life insurance, (which I am a HUGE advocate of), money wasn't an issue. Buying presents for kids all by myself was.

The boys were easy. Anything Star Wars related and they were happy. I had them done in a microsecond. Oriahna was a different issue.

I could not find a present for her. She had dolls, she had toys, she had clothes...how hard could it be to buy a present for a 2 year old girl! My husband had done all the shopping for kids before. He was such a big kid himself, he knew exactly what to get to make them excited on Christmas morning.

So here I was wandering around Toys R Us with a cart full of Star Wars toys, tears in my eyes, going up and down the aisles wondering what to buy for her. I said a little prayer even, I think it was probably the silliest request he's ever gotten..."Money's not the problem, Heavenly Father, I AM! What should I get her???"

Then I rounded a corner and there it was...like a television show when the new product comes out on the spinning stage with the spotlight on it. Well, it wasn't that shiny, but it felt like it to me. The Barbie Big Wheel.

I hugged the box and put it in my cart. I know its a dumb story...but I still get emotional thinking about it.

AND NOW...

(Same year actually)

The night before Christmas we were getting ready. I let the kids pick out what cookies we were going to give Santa. They chose Grasshoppers. You know, those nasty chocolate cookies with mint filling. ICK!

So I laid them out with the milk. They gave Santa a huge helping, so he left a few.

The next morning the kids were excited, playing with their new toys...the Barbie Big Wheel zooming around the house. Jefferson found Santa's leftovers and said, "Mom, can I have a cookie."

I shuddered, "You can have all of those cookies that you want!" They hadn't actually tried them yet, they had just bought them for Santa.

So Jefferson took a bite. Stopped. The look on his face was PRICELESS! I giggled and said, "Go ahead and spit it out." I watched him run off to the bathroom and didn't think much of it until later.

Later was when his brother came running out of the bathroom shouting, "MOM! MOM! SANTA PUKED IN THE TUB!"

Sure enough, Jefferson had spit out the Grasshopper into the tub. Jaylan had gone in and found it, and assumed that Santa had just had too many cookies for one night.