I had terrific, FUN Christmases as a child. It's only well after that that I grew to dislike Christmas. Hubby's whole family was together for one of our first Christmases, and I was shocked to see everyone's gifts piled beside them, and suddenly they all grabbed their gifts and start tearing off the wrapping...everybody.... all at once! Noise, everybody talking, paper ripping and flying around. You couldn't tell who gave what to whom, and you couldn't watch the person open YOUR gift and get to see their reaction. To me, that was awful, and quite disappointing.
In my family, first we'd all get our stockings and bring them to the table and begin digging in one little present at a time, watching other's just as much as opening our own stuff. Lots of laughter and fun. We'd put in the stockings a lot of funny or practical, just interesting or frequently peculiar little presents. Even flashlight batteries were wrapped; my dad used to wrap quarters, and one year I gave every person a different pair of animal magnets; my dad got two scotty-dogs, one black and one white; if you put them face to face they would spin around until the dogs were nose to tail. He laughed and laughed until tears ran down his cheeks and kept chuckling for long after. It was amazing to me, because he laughed like I've never seen him laugh before! But whatever, it was always fascinating. We loved to find odd little things that no one would ever expect, so every Christmas, the stockings were kind of a 'contest' as to who could find the most bizarre or weird things to give.
After the stockings were empty, we would eat breakfast and then get dressed before going in to the living-room tree with all the gifts under it. We had one of us hand out presents one-by-one, trying to make sure everyone got their turn to open a gift before going back to the first person, who would then get their second present. There were usually 7 of us there, and we all watched to see who it was from and then what it was. It made the present opening last several lazy hours, and everyone got to enjoy everyone else's gifts in addition to their own. You ended up feeling you had a lot more Christmas than if you just opened your presents in a rush. Never saw any person or family who did Christmas like we did, and felt very let down by that.
{ As POTUS would so eloquently say, "Sad." }
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