The day before yesterday was my daughter’s eleventh birthday. Though she enjoyed receiving a new Wii game, a Target gift card, a gym bag and some cash, I’m pretty sure her favorite present was this handmade card from her little brother.
Because people throw around that heart and soul stuff all the time, but when you say blood you really mean it.
1. You know you are a true chocoholic when you realize there isn’t a chocolate nut cluster in the world that stands a chance against you.
2. Or, a peanut butter blossom.
3. If your son has never had an instance where he has scratched his crotch in public, you can be sure he will do it for the first time in the middle of his school Christmas play.
4. When he’s standing directly in front of the principal.
5. And, you can be sure he’ll do it for a second time when he’s performing during the children’s Christmas Eve Mass.
6. While standing in front of an entire congregation.
7. And your priest.
8. You may underestimate how bad of a charades player your sister says she is, until she acts out West Side Story by simply belting out, “Maria…”
9. If your daughter gets a camera for Christmas, it’s possible that she will think she is the next Annie Lebovitz and you will have to pose for pictures for days on end.
10. And, during those days on end when you’ve been living off of beer, wine, egg nog, rum, Bailey’s and apple pie, you probably won’t look very pretty in those photographs.
11. When you are 38 years old and your parents still spoil you, you’ll feel like a kid again.
12. If you are participating in a White Elephant gift exchange, you won’t feel so bad about contributing something tacky when you receive a clock from 1982. With dust on it.
13. If you have to make three different trips to the carry out in the middle of your family gathering, you will realize that you are related to a forgetful bunch.
14. Either that, or they drink a lot.
For as long as I can remember, my husband, our two kids and I have gathered around our dining room table for a traditional dinner on Christmas Eve. First, we attend church, then come home and I put a ham in the oven.
The only problem with this arrangement, is that the children’s Mass, in which my kids often participate, is at 6:00 PM…which means we don’t get home until after 7:00. I don’t like to leave the oven on when we’re not home, so Christmas Eve dinner is always a very late one.
This year I tried something new. I pulled out my gigantic, electric roaster and threw the ham inside before we left for church. That way we came home to a fully cooked ham.
Actually, it was a little too fully cooked.
And as we sat around the table aglow with candlelight and set with my mother’s Christmas china, my daughter didn’t let it go unnoticed when she said, “You know, I like dry meat. It’s easier to cut.”
The other night, around sunset, my son asked if he could turn on the Christmas tree lights. Before I had a chance to answer, my daughter turned to him and said, “Can I turn on the lights tonight? You always do it.”
My son replied, “Sure.” Then his face turned red, his eyes filled with tears and he said, “As long as you smile really big like I do when I turn them on.”
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