Busted on Christmas Eve - Saturday Night Genealogy Fun



Compliments of
The Vintage Cottage

This is my contribution for Randy Seaver's SNGF - Being Santa Claus.

The mission:

1) Tell us your favorite memory of "being Santa Claus." Have you ever put on the red suit? Were you Santa Claus to your children or grandchildren? Did you bring gifts to people out of the love in your heart?

2) Tell us in a comment to this blog post, in your own blog post, in a Facebook status or a Google Plus stream post.

 
Most parents are familiar with the Christmas Eve ritual of putting together Santa's gifts on Christmas Eve. Our family is no different. Except I also wrap the stocking stuffers and a gift from Santa in wrapping paper different from that of the rest of the family. On this particular year, our youngest was maybe 3. Definitely young enough to really believe in Santa Claus. The children were tucked all snug in their beds and I had Santa gifts spread all over the living room floor for assembly and special wrapping treatment. It looked just like Santa's workshop.

All of a sudden this tiny voice behind me spoke! This "Santa" freaked out and froze. I was caught. Red handed. I don't remember why she was out of bed but Husband was a quick thinker swooping her up and flying up the stairs and out of sight with our little darling. Apparently she was sleep walking (for the first time), wasn't coherent and had no memory of the incident in the morning. Whew!!! Santa was off the hook and a merry Christmas was had by all.

Wishing you and your family a Merry Christmas or Happy Holiday season!




© 2011, copyright Michelle Goodrum

Advent Calendar - December 24 – Christmas Eve

© 2010, copyright Michelle Goodrum  Our favorite Christmas Eve activity actually started several days ahead. When our kids were little, we were boarding our horses at a friend's place so we would pile the kids and some of their friends in the car and go down to visit the horses. While we were there, we would get a small amount of grain and hay to leave out as a snack for Santa's reindeer on Christmas Eve.

Shortly before the kids went to bed on Christmas Eve, we would go out front and leave the reindeer their snack in the front yard. Then after they were asleep, Husband would go out and clean most of it up but he would always leave some scraps. Since the reindeer were in a hurry, they left quite a trail of hay across the front yard, on the garden wall, the bushes next to the house, and even several strands hanging from the edge of the roof.

In the morning, usually after we opened presents, we would go outside and those little girls were absolutely enthralled with the trail of hay Santa's reindeer left behind!

Photo by jonseidman1988

Advent Calendar - December 19 – Christmas Shopping

© 2010, copyright Michelle Goodrum  Christmas shopping has really changed in our family the past few years. I can remember getting up early on Black Friday to hit the stores and get the good deals. Husband even stood in line at 4 AM one year to get a screaming deal on a ping pong table for the kids. Now Youngest Child is the one getting up at oh dark thirty to get the good deals and stretch her limited budget. This year, I must say she did quite well, from what I've seen that is...

I am another story. I love to shop online and find that perfect gift for those hard to shop for people (and we have several in our family). If I work it right, I sometimes manage to find a deal or at least free shipping. I still spent plenty of time in the stores but online shopping has been a real Godsend and has made the holidays a little less frantic.

Advent Calendar - December 18 - Christmas Stockings

© 2010, copyright Michelle Goodrum Oh, how Christmas stockings have changed since I was a child! Like food portions in our society, the stocking sizes have grown! A few years ago, Mom gave me my childhood stocking thinking I might like to hang it over the fireplace on Christmas Eve. Actually, I would have loved to but it would have been about half the size of everyone else's!

As a kid, we would find our stockings stuffed, on Christmas morning, with Santa's gifts wrapped in the same paper Mom used for everything else. I never could understand that but also never thought to ask.

I looked forward to the chocolate coins Santa would leave every year. In the bottom of the stocking there was always a navel orange which made for a good mid-morning snack. As an adult, I found out Santa always left Dad a navel orange in his stocking when he was growing up. It seems that it was a good way to make sure the stocking was full during the Depression and WWII years. My parents continued the tradition. I have been known on an occassion to put those scrumptious Cutie oranges in my family's stocking as well.


Photo by melalouise

Advent Calendar - December 17th - Favorite Holiday Shows

With only 3 major TV networks to choose from when I was a kid growing up in the 1960s, our television holiday choices were somewhat limited, unlike today with cable TV and dozens of channels to choose from. It seems like we mostly watched the same shows in December year after year: A Charlie Brown Christmas, How the Grinch Stole Christmas, Frost the Snowman, and my favorite, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. (For a trip down memory lane check out the list of US Christmas specials on wikipedia.)

I have to admit, however, the second half of Rudolph, after he ran away and came across the Abominable Snowman, was a bit more than I could take. I had to leave and hide my head under a pillow in another room until it was safe to come out. Admittedly, I missed quite a bit of Rudolph in those days. Fortunately, I outgrew my fear of the Abominable Snowman and Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer remains one of my favorite holiday TV shows.

Photo by foggydave
© 2010, copyright Michelle Goodrum

Advent Calendar - December 9 – Grab Bag

When I was a child, my parents would put presents under the tree in the days leading up to Christmas, as the presents were wrapped. Crawling around under the tree to discover any new packages was great fun. It was even more fun to try and guess what was in the package!

When Santa came Christmas Eve, he would stuff our stocking with wrapped gifts and leave "the big gift" unwrapped under the tree. I was always perplexed though. Santa used the same wrapping paper as my parents. I just didn't get it.

When we had a family of our own, I was determined not to leave any question whatsoever as to the genuineness of Santa Claus. Special wrapping or tissue paper was purchased and hidden. Any gifts that went into the stockings must have different wrapping paper from presents under the tree. We laugh about it now but apparently I was successful.


© 2010, copyright Michelle Goodrum

Advent Calendar - Santa Claus

Do I believe in Santa Claus? You bet!

There's nothing like seeing the wonderment in a child's eyes and hearing squeals (or screams) of joy on Christmas morning when they see what Santa brought.  Even playing Santa Claus through various charitable programs leaves me feeling really good even though I never see the faces of the children and their families.

Preserving that spirit is not without challenges however. One year the neighbor kids told our kids that it's Mom or Dad who writes the thank you note Santa leaves next to his milk and cookies. We had to go though handwriting analysis to prove it really was Santa who was writing those notes. A little nerve wracking but we passed.

I don't know exactly when Oldest Child figured out the truth about Santa Claus. We knew that she knew but she wasn't about to come clean. It turns out she was afraid she wouldn't get any more gifts from Santa if she let on to what she knew.

Youngest Child came home from school in 6th grade and sat me down for "the talk." Her best friend's mom had given her daughter "the talk" and now Youngest Child needed to know what was really going on. It was a traumatic conversation for the both of us, tears and all.

Our conversation ended with this: everyone is Santa Claus. This is the season of giving and it's as much fun, if not more, to play Santa by giving as it is to receive. Santa is not going away. With that, we started a new tradition in our family; Santa still stuffs the stockings Christmas Eve, only now there are several Santas doing the stocking stuffing in our house.

We also do at least one Christmas Angel every year, which the kids immensely enjoy assisting in selecting the gifts. I just wish we could be flies on the wall and see the wonderment and hear the sounds of joy from those children for whom we were able to play Santa.

© 2010, copyright Michelle Goodrum

Advent Calendar - Outdoor Decorations

One of our family's favorite ways of enjoying outdoor holiday decorations over the years has been to visit the annual ZooLights display at the Phoenix Zoo. We have taken many out of town guests to ZooLights and have seen immense changes as it has grown. Visiting the zoo at night has also been a great way to see some of the nocturnal animals when they are more active.

The constantly changing colored ball over the lake is a new addition since our last visit to ZooLights.

Every few minutes a new piece of holiday music is played and the lights in this avenue of trees change in time to the music. It attracts quite a crowd.

This is the first year we went with no children (they had other plans). I have to say, it's just not the same without kids. However, I was able to be my geeky self by bringing my camera bag and tripod along without having to embarass any teens!

© 2010, copyright Michelle Goodrum

December 4 – Christmas Cards

The tradition of sending Christmas cards seems to have changed over the last hundred years. This year, I'm going to focus on my great grandparents generation. They seemed to like to send postcards like these.

I am really thankful to have them because this line would have been a dead end for us otherwise. We have literally pieced the family together through clues left in their correspondence. Unfortunately for me, much of it is in French, which I do not speak, so translating has been slow!


© 2010, copyright Michelle Goodrum

Advent Calendar - The Christmas Tree

Growing up we always had a real Christmas tree. It seemed like it was huge but as an adult, when I stand in our family's living room, I realize it wasn't all that tall because we didn't have tall ceilings! I was just small. We would all decorate the tree every year.

After Husband and I were living in Arizona and had a family of our own, we continued to purchase a real tree every year. It was quite the production with the entire family driving around town to all the Christmas tree lots to find the very best tree. The kids thought it was great fun and they would come home tired so it worked out wonderfully!

Over time, we realized we were waiting until closer and closer to Christmas to buy our real tree so that it wouldn't be all dried out by the time Christmas Day rolled around. We tried to do all the right things to keep our trees from drying out but the dry Arizona environment just isn't conducive to real Christmas trees. Finally, we gave in and bought a huge, beautiful, but fake tree. Now we buy a nice smelling "real" wreath to make up for the lack of a real tree.


© 2010, copyright Michelle Goodrum