I’m Just Curious: Merry Christmas!

by Debbie Walker

Yes. That is right. In my house it is called Merry Christmas. Too late to wish people Happy Holidays, after all we are past Thanksgiving, and to me that is one of those holidays. I have no interest in being “politically correct.” That whole thing is ridiculous. Okay, enough of that!

I imagine you may have noticed your Christmas’ have changed over the years, just as mine have. One thing I remember from years ago was the craziness of buying for a small child, we only had one. There was one year in particular that I remember. Her father and I went crazy trying to make sure we got Deana everything she wanted. She may have been six.

It was the year of Barbie Camper, Barbie House, Barbie Clothes, sled; the only thing she wanted that we didn’t get was a Bride doll. It also wasn’t from lack of hunting! We learned something that Christmas. Deana spent the entire afternoon outside sliding on a cardboard box, not even the sled we bought!

So that year we learned that kids suffer from a case of the “I wants,” somewhat prompted by all the Christmas advertisements. I believe we did a bit better in those coming years.

When the grandkids came along and their parents had the job it did take a lot of pressure off me. Then I put my own pressure on. After a few years I thought about how a month after Christmas they probably wouldn’t have been able to tell me what I had bought for them because it was all piled into the “STUFF” they had received. So I decided to do something different. And believe it or not, they were okay with what I decided. I decided to give them experiences. We were in Florida so I had quite a few choices. One year was a trip to MOSI, Museum of Science and they loved it. I sent them to Silver Springs one year. The experiences were great for a few years, and then I needed to come up with something new for the teen years.

Sooo…… I knew there was time yet but they would one day be going off to college or at the very least into their own place and would need “things.” I decided to get them little things, little things that I really like to have in my kitchen. I even wrapped their gifts in aluminum foil! They loved it, besides all their gifts they were still young enough to have fun with a big ball of foil to throw around! I thought they would think I was nuts but they loved it! The next year I asked if they wanted me to come up with something different or fly as usual. They told me to fly as usual and they laughed.

For about four years I bought them kitchen things, also got them some holiday decorations as each holiday had clearance prices! I used the Dollar Tree, thrift stores, Family Dollar and Dollar General and Walmart where I got their coffee pot, toaster, etc.

It kind of makes me think, all the changes, different ages and such; sort of makes me think the holidays are what you make of them. So…. In my house it is MERRY CHRISTMAS to You and Yours

I’m just curious what ideas you came up with over the years of change. Contact me at dwdaffy@yahoo.com, sub line: Christmas. Thanks for reading.