Daddy, can you help me?

Okay. This is kind of a tradition, mixed with a memory, that I really only remember because of a home video.

Tomorrow morning when my family wakes up, we won't go directly to the stockings and the tree. Tradition dictates that Christmas breakfast has to be eaten first. For as long as I can remember we have had bacon, sausage, eggs, hash browns, and pancakes on Christmas morning. We would have to walk past the living room with our eyes closed, to the kitchen. Where mom would have prepared an AMAZING meal. Some people would find this frustrating, but its a family tradition that I love, and when I have kids of my own will continue with them.

Here is where the memory comes in, though as I said, it was captured on home video and that may be the only reason I remember it. One year the rest of us had finished breakfast, but Sarah had taken more than she could handle and still had quite a bit left. With David and I waiting on her, and herself wanting to see the presents just as badly, she turned to Dad and said, "Daddy, can you help me?" as a request for him to eat some of her food. For some reason that has struck us all as funny over the years, and its a quote we recall when talking about home videos.

Thank you all for reading about my Christmas memories and traditions, and for your love and support. I wish you all a Merry Christmas and hope that it is a good one what will add to your own stock of Christmas memories.

Santa's Elf

Okay, I guess I should have said that each day I'd tell you about a Christmas memory, or a Christmas tradition. Because today I have another tradition for you.

My family does something a little strange, though maybe not since all of us are too old to believe in Santa. Instead of leaving treats for Santa, he leaves us goodies. Well, a few years ago, I asked Dad if I could tag along when he bought the goodies. We decided that Dad and I made a good team, and ever since then I've played Santa's elf. Each year as Christmas draws nearer I turn to Dad and ask, "when are Santa and his elf going shopping?" and we pick a day to go goodie shopping. We make a list each year, and sometimes it gets quite difficult to find an item or two on our list. But even if it takes us 4 stores to find it, we do just that. And that my dear people is another Christmas tradition for you.

Stockings

Okay, this is the entry for yesterday.

Of course with Christmas you have to have stockings for Santa to fill. My family had some when I was younger made out of yarn, knitted or something. Somewhere in our house we still have those, but they aren't the ones we use anymore. While we lived in our first house in Layton, so when I was between 5 and 10, we made new ones. Each one of our stockings has a unique puppy or puppies on it in a little circle of fabric. I remember picking out our favorite and which one was going to go on whose stocking. Once we picked them out, mom cut them out and ironed them onto our stockings. Then we got to decorate the top of our stocking with our name, and other things. It was a really fun activity for the family, and each year when we pull out the stockings, its a memory we have together.

Decorations, Christmas decorations to be exact.

Okay, obviously I am a slacker/ busy getting back home and I missed another entry. So here is another double for you. Both of these have to do with Christmas decorations we have in my house.

1. The Tree- here's the deal. My Dad is REALLY picky about how we decorate our tree. It has to fit the color scheme and elegance to be allowed on the tree as an ornament. As children we had our own tree for the decorations we made, and I've loved it that way. Our tree is beautiful as a result, but we love to tease Dad about it. As part of our teasing him, we like to hide things on the tree that don't belong there, and see how long it takes him to find it. One year, David hid his Yoda action figure on the tree...and we never found it again. And that is one of my favorite stories about our beautiful tree.

2. The Christmas count-down calendar: Our family has this awesome Christmas count-down calendar. There is a pocket for every day of December up to Christmas, and each day you move the little mouse from pocket to pocket. It's been around for as long as I can remember and as children we'd race each day to be the one to change it. Now the challenge is to keep up with my Dad. He likes to move it to the wrong day of the month, and we have to move it back.

So, there are just a couple of Christmas memories/traditions of mine. 4 days till Christmas!

mmmm delicious

I am so sorry that I forgot to do an entry yesterday! Today you get to have two memories. And actually...they aren't really memories, but traditions. Both food related.

1. Grandpa's fudge. AMAZING in a square of goodness. He makes multiple flavors and I love them all, but the best has got to be mint. And it is even better because they are usually the green ones!

2. Hot chocolate with Dad. Dad and I both love hot chocolate, so a lot of the time, one of us will make some for the other along with our own, and we'll enjoy a delicious mugs of hot chocolate together.

If You Like Pina Colada....

Then you would love my family's Christmas tradition. Of course, they are virgin, alcohol free pina coladas, but every Christmas eve we have pina coladas! In all honesty, the last few years it doesn't always happen on Christmas Eve, but we always make sure to have it some time during the holiday season. Its another family Christmas tradition that I love!

And they were sore afraid

This story cracks me up. Sadly people usually don't' find it as funny as me, and I guess it was one of those "had to be there" moments. However, I want to share it anyway. As I'm sure many of you do, our family acts out the Nativity scene on Christmas Eve. We do this with the extended family at Grandma and Grandpa Hirschi's. A couple years ago Sarah, Liesel, Abby, and myself were assigned to play the shepherds. Now, for those of you who don't' know, we girls tend to get a little silly when we're together. Specifically Abby and Sarah....no offense to them. Well, this happened to be one of those nights. I believe my father, or Grandpa was narrator that year, well, whoever it was got to the verse where it says the shepherds saw the angel, and they were sore afraid. Of course, Sarah and Abby got the brilliant idea to really act afraid. And it was hilarious. Of course, those two acting afraid would have been funny in and of itself, but this also happened to be the year that Uncle Clark, as the angel, leaped over the corner of a small table type thing to get to where he wanted to go. Who wouldn't be afraid of furniture leaping angels? It really was quite an entertaining Nativity that year, and if I recall correctly somebody has it on tape somewhere....so if you ever get the chance to see it, you'll know why it was so memorable to me.

The Long Way Home

Okay, the count is now down to TEN days till Christmas. My memory for today isn't really one memory, but a combination of many. Or really I just want to share with you an old family tradition that I love. My family loves Christmas lights, who wouldn't right? Not only do we love putting up tons of lights on our own house, but we always loved going for drives to look at them too. Most often our yearly lights drive would occur on a Sunday sometime in December, after a visit to Grandma B in Centerville. Instead of going home on the freeway we would go the backroad, or as we called it "the long way". It's really not that much longer of a drive, but when we made it a Christmas light drive, it became much longer. We'd spend an hour or so in neighborhoods on the way home looking at lights and singing Christmas songs together. My favorite parts of this tradition were the houses that had the "special" decorations we would notice. The house with the HUGE pine in the front yard, completely covered in lights. But especially the word NOEL on the side of the hill. We spent some great times as a family on those drives. They don't' happen as much anymore, and usually not for as long either, but they will always be a special Christmas memory for me.

Sing Choirs of Angels

Or more like, sing angelic choirs. Today I went to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir Christmas Concert, and because the tickets I got were for this morning it was combined with music and the spoken word. The guests this year were Brian Stokes Mitchell and Edward K. Hermann. Everything was simply amazing and it was fun to go with Nathan, Brittany(Nathan's friend/girlfriend), and my friend JPo from my ward. (Just friend) I loved it all so much I can't pick a favorite song at all.

So, now that I've told you about my day, let me connect it to a memory for my twelve days of Christmas;

Because of friendships my grandparents have, my family has always found it easier than most to get tickets to the Motab Christmas concert. One year, my family went to the night they were making sure everything was recorded, so they didn't' do the program exactly in order or smoothly. At one point we as the audience were left waiting for like 30 minutes. I was wearing a scarf, and so I turned to my Dad and said, "Dad, teach me how to tie a tie. We can use my scarf" So, that is what Dad and I did for the rest of the break. I learned how to tie a tie, or should I say a scarf. To this day, my skills aren't amazing, but I know the basic steps. It's a small memory, but one that I enjoy. One of those seemingly meaningless moments that build up a lifetime.

12 Days of Christmas

That's right folks, there are only 12 days before Christmas! YAY! So, I have decided that on each of the twelve days of Christmas I am going to share one Christmas memory with y'all. So, here is number one;

12 Days of Christmas to Grandma Ruth

I don't' remember exactly what year we did this, but I was quite young and my Great Grandma Hirschi lived in Apple Tree Assisted Living Center in Kaysville, Utah. My parents decided that we were going to do the Twelve Days of Christmas to her. So, each night, my father would pick one of us kids to go with him. That was a special privilege. Then, we would sneak into Apple Tree, at the side door of her hall. We would leave a small treat or gift for her outside her door and knock, and then hide. We'd check back to make sure she'd gotten our gift and then leave for the night. Because I was so young, I don't' remember anything that we gave her, but I remember cherishing the time with dad, and doing something special for Grandma Ruth.