Christmas Memories

This post is dedicated to my family, who are probably the only people who will laugh at some of these.

I was thinking today about how great Christmas is and how much fun it is to spend time with family and all the different traditions and memories:

• When Callie was probably 5 or 6, she got this totally awesome yo-yo from Santa that would light up red and yellow when it was yo-ing. Well, neither Callie and I knew the proper wrist action for the yo-yo, so my dad was nominated for the inaugural yo. He was on his knees and didn't really judge distance really well, so as soon as he let go of the yo-yo, it glided down with a beautiful, gracefulness; hit the carpet, and busted into three pieces and the batteries went flying across the room. What makes this even better is that we have it captured on VHS.
• As a child, my best Christmas ever was in 1986--the one right before Callie was born. Santa found my house and stayed for a while dropping off a million presents. I can remember getting a Barbie Corvette, a Barbie Hawaiian Adventure landscape (complete with jetskis and waterskis), a Barbie poolside and cabana, a Cabbage Patch doll, a doctor's set, a Madame Alexander bride, and quite a few other things. It was pretty sweet.
• The other funny things about that Christmas was that it coined two very cute things that I did and captured them on video. The first thing was when I opened up the Madame Alexander bride, I exclaimed, "SHE'S GETTIN MAEEHHREEEEEEEEEEED!" [married] in, like, the best southern accent ever. And then when I got the doctor's kit, I pulled out the stethoscope, walked over to my mom (who was 7 months pregnant with baby Callie), put the stethoscope up to her tummy and said, "Your baby's doin juuuuuuuuust fine." [I'm pretty positive I was the cutest child ever.]
• Watching our Lhasa-Apso, Snuffie, go hogwild crazy over his Christmas morning rawhide and then plowing through all the wrapping and tissue paper.
• Going to the family service at Mt. Olive in the early evening, coming home and eating mom's mini-ham sandwiches and chili, opening a Christmas gift (specifically selected by momma), and then going back to church at 10:30 p.m. for the candlelight service. I can also remember my papaw always helping me out of my coat once we got into the dark sanctuary with the pretty Christmas music playing.
• The sheer chaos that is opening gifts at my nanny's house Christmas night, which usually included about 20 people and at one point spanned 4 Bolick generations.
• Going boating in Seven Lakes at my granddaddy's house in December (IT WAS FREEZING!)
• When I was in high school, leaving my nanny's and heading over to Shannon's to meet up with all my friends to hit up the movie theatre.
• Callie and I fighting for on-air time on my dad's video camera, pushing each other out of the way, singing Christmas carols to the camera, and then the one shot of Callie holding the mechanical Rudolph on her head, glaring at the camera, and saying, "LAURA, LAURA, LAURA!! LOOK AT ME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
• My nanny's incredible home cooking.
• Our tradition of decorating the Christmas tree as a family. My mom always cooked awesome appetizers--I can especially remember the shrimp cocktails. I also loved getting all those awesome Hallmark ornaments!!
• Santa Land presents at Clyde Campbell
• One specific Christmas, when Callie was still in her crib, and we were decorating the tree, gathering as a family to say the blessing. Callie was standing in her crib and mom and I were each holding one of her hands. As soon as the blessing was over, we both said Amen, and let go of Callie, who promptly fell backwards in her crib.
• "Daddy, daddy, daddy, daddy, daddy, Can you see me? Can you see me, daddy? Am I on the camera? Daddy? Daddy? Am I there? Daddy? Daddy? DADDY???????"
• Mom and dad having to wake US up on Christmas morning because we always slept late.
• Christmas morning casseroles and, eventually, mimosas.
• Me saying, "Angel make noise" to the music-box-like-angel that my mom put in my bedroom at Fort Bragg.
• Harry Connick, Jr., Amy Grant, and Mariah Carey on the Sharp 5-disc CD changer.

I'm sure there are so many more, but those are some of the ones that I just thought of, off the top of my head...