This post is another repeat, one I usually re-post every year. I’ve made a couple of updates to ages and gifts.
The Secret Sam was my favorite Christmas present as a child. I still have it, and I will keep it, or perhaps pass it on to a grandchild. Oh, how I was excited and hoping the year I asked for my own Secret Sam. My mother told me it was a boy’s toy, but I was never a Barbie doll girl.
That was my spy year, my year of intrepid adventures around the neighborhood. It was one of my last Christmases as a child, I think, wanting toys and dreaming of adventures. Not too many years later, perhaps even the next one, my Christmas gifts would be stereos and albums, bell bottom jeans and paisley print turtlenecks.
Perhaps that is why the memory of it is such a treasure to me.
This year my grandchildren will be blessed with the breathless anticipation of what might be under the tree Christmas morning. They will be late to bed, too excited to sleep easily, and early to rise, rushing to the living room in all the excitement and wonder a child can have.
They are being taught the real reason for Christmas, and they will have opened the last flap on the Advent calendar the day before, they will place Jesus in the manger on Christmas morning, and some of them will have caught snippets of the Christmas story, perhaps even at Midnight Mass, but most are still too young to really understand the Biblical readings.
They have a book here at my house that unfolds into the journey to Bethlehem, and all the figures are there to travel or meet Mary and Joseph along the way. We read stories, we sing songs, we watch videos.
Together we have baked cookies and breads and made treats, and we have given them away. One granddaughter talks about Jesus and Mary and Joseph as if she is speaking of beloved family members who have gone on an exciting trip. She loves moving the nativity figures closer to the stable as Christmas approaches.
She is nine years old this year, and half the gifts she has asked for are toys, but the other half consists of cooking classes and more grown up gifts. Last year her gifts included lots of cooking paraphernalia. She’s been making biscuits, breads, and cookies with me since she could stand in a chair, and now she wants to learn to cook on her own, more things than just breads.
This tells me her childhood days are beginning that wonderful, terrible transition into her preteen and maturing years. That fills me with joy as I see the wonder and potential in her, all the gifts and innocence she has to offer to the world. But as her grandmother, oh, how I’m going to miss my little girl, the first grandchild God gave to us.
We now have eight grandchildren, and two of them are older than her, some of them having come into our family through marriage. The youngest is three, probably my favorite year to get to spend Christmas with a child. This year I’ll enjoy as much of his wonder and excitement as I can. Note: he’s now four.
I want to help nurture faith, hope, and love, generosity, joy, as well as create memories and enjoy the anticipation. I want to see Christmas through the eyes of happy children who see so clearly the joy, the promise, and the simpleness of it all.
Most of all, I want to share the feelings, the very same feelings of a child who exclaims “I love Jesus!” and means it with all their heart.
May your Christmas Eve be blessed with warmth and hope and family and stockings that will soon be full, a house filled with scents of the season, and the anticipation of the birth of our Savior.
I pray for those who can’t be home, especially our service men and women, all those who work to keep us safe and healthy, and those who just can’t be home with loved ones. I pray for those who are alone in the world, for children who won’t have a joyful and warm and safe Christmas.
I pray for those who are suffering and isolated because of the pandemic, and for families separated because of illness or quarantine.
I pray for the world to share the joy and peace of the season. God bless us every one.
This is not a political post. Please limit your comments accordingly, and allow us to enjoy some Christmas fun and cheer.
Wishing a merry Christmas to all my fellow treepers.
I don’t recall ever anticipating or hoping for any particular present at Christmas. But I do remember that “This is right, this is for them!” spark when finding the right gift for someone. Not chocolates, scented candles or socks. But something right for that someone.
This year I lost my father to the second AZ shot. And it has made me realize that gifting is just another way of expressing our love for others. Time is fleeting. There is not always a next Christmas.
The gifts are but wrapping. The true present of Christmas is quality time together with family and friends.
My sincerest sympathy…., Konrad. 🙏🏽💖
Condolences first. Sorry for your loss this year.
And also, like you, I miss the days of “real” shopping, wondering about the person, searching for just the right thing, thinking “harder,” and the delight in finally matching him/her to the right gift. These days, individuals send me their Amazon wish lists and are annoyed if I don’t share one of my own. Alas.
I’m so sorry for your loss. I admire your attitude. May you have a blessed Christmas.
I am sorry for your loss.
We will not let them steal Christmas from us. God bless.
I am so sorry for your loss, Konrad. I hope through all the madness you were able to spend quality time with your dad.
Merry Christmas to you and all those you love dearly.
My Deep Condolences And 🙏Prayers Konrad. I’m Confident You’ll Make Others Feel
Love❤️ And Happiness Because Of Your Presence. Bless You And Yours On This Christmas.
I’ll Be Alone Because I’m In A Facility This Christmas But I’ll Pray🙏 To Jesus For Those Around Me For Most Are Worse Off Than I. ✝️Merry Christmas To Everyone❤️✝️
Konrad, How true and comforting to me !!!
I had one from the sixties that was “seven guns in one”.
A grenade launcher on top, rocket launchers, and a rifle that fired hard white plastic bullets. Giving your child such a real weapon today would no doubt be child abuse.
That nifty weapon, Raptors2022, was the one and only “Johnny Seven O.M.A. (One Man Army)”. I got one too, along with a boys Khaki green shirt with a “U.S. Army” patch on it. Man, that was a Christmas to behold!!!
To my, and my youngest brother’s surprise, we both got roller skates –with a key! We found every dry patch of pavement the week after Christmas. People looked at us a lot, but we sure felt lucky.
The things I couldn’t wait for every Christmas was the food.
My mother’s brigole and meatballs cooked in that special once a year tomato sauce, great grandma’s ravioli with two kinds of filling –with that same sauce, Ma’s homemade bread and her to die for sausage. We had that base meal every Christmas until 2 years ago; at 87 Ma still did it all (with some help from us kids).
Merry Christmas to All❣
Spousal unit & i had those early years chez his Italian/Irish family .They did turkey , ham etc .Finally the kids pleaded for a “red Christmas “ . PAsta , Bricole, sausage , MEAtballs ! fugghetabout the turkey business ..But do NOT omit the cookies ! Lovely , fragrant, tasty best ever togetherness.
I never got roller skates because I lived on a dirt road in the coastal south.
What an absolutely lovely story about your grandchildren. My oldest is 32, my youngest will be 19 on New Year’s Day. In my experience, such as it is, the closest bonds with our grandkids is at that early preteen age. The ones I was able to spend the most time with at that age are like the beating of my heart. Of course I love them all dearly but the heart to heart bond is especially strong with those I was able to spend the most time with. Boy did we have fun, and now such great memories.
my favorite Christmas gift was a scooby doo transistor radio. My mother was in the hospital that year. i wish i still had it !!!
also may the Lord and the reason for the season be with you all. i love you all and my joy and wishes for you are for always !!
I always enjoy your beautiful posts Menagerie! Our oldest grandson who is 7 sounds like like your granddaughter who loves to talk about God and Jesus all the time. He comes to me sometimes and asks if I will pray with him. Melts my heart. This year I’m giving him his first rosary because he’s learning that in school now. The boy loves to pray and I can’t wait to be able to pray the rosary with him. I was telling him about how I bought the rosary I use from the Vatican when we went to Italy. His eyes grew big and said wow, that’s like coming from God lol.
Wishing a Merry & Blessed Christmas to your family & all the others here at CTH.
Merry, merry, merry CHRISTmas to all!
Man oh man, I got one in a store in Oklahoma don’t know where, I was 7 and there was a hippie festival of sorts going on main street. That was 66,67 although it could’ve been later cause those memories run together are way back now.
I remember Brazil nuts, oranges, peppermint candy and a long leaf pine cut by my dad on the coast of North Carolina. I had my Santa wonder years in the 50’s with always a live nativity at our little Methodist church. I always wanted to be Mary in the nativity, but I was a blonde and always lost out to a brunette. Wonderful memories. Merry Christmas Treepers. I am blessed to have found my perch.
“You’ll put your eye out with that Red Ryder BB gun!” 😃
The first time I watched that movie, I didn’t know that brand actually existed … no doubt thanks to the movie.
BB guns were certainly real. We shot frogs in the back of the head (not exactly American Sniper).
I made the mistake of firing at a tree a few feet away. The BB came back and hit me in the chest.
My big game hunting days came to an abrupt end.
I got a Daisy bb gun when I was 12 and my younger brother got his two years later. He passed Jan 1 of this year. I have both guns in the garage, still functional.
The only toy I had asked for was a Barbie doll. And with that, I developed an interest in fashion designing. My young adult life took another route, a better one, and I am grateful for that.
Happiness in our life is to be cherished. For with happiness, we have peace. Therefore, I wish great happiness to all Treepers. And we must thank the Lord every day for every door he closes, a greater one opens.
I caught my foster father dead to rights on my brief case camera flirting with the next door widow woman…I was just too young to afford camera film or possess the knowledge that cameras even needed it…
I look forward to your Christmas stories so very much. Thank you so much and Merry Christmas 🙏🏻
…prelude to Christmas,
…it’s a time, amongst all times, to selflessly help,
( it is also time to resist asking questions, as Joy arrives…)
Christmas on the prairie, 1975.
Thanks to Jesus…and subsequently the Ingalls…and…untold millions of others…
Video
Menagerie,
What a beautiful, heartfelt post! I hope your Christmas Eve, Christmas, and the rest of your holiday season were even better than your most hopeful expectation. Your grandchildren are more blessed than they could possibly know to have a grandmother like you!
Thank ou!