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Karen's post about the stores pushing Christmas has gotten me to thinking about Christmas and Christmas' past. What is your fondest memory from a past Christmas? I am not really talking presents you received although if it was an "extra special" one I guess that qualifies. What I mean is that special moment, or thought that has stayed with you all these years.

Mine would be Christmas 1988. My mother started getting nostalgic about everything and wanted to have a special day with just her 4 children. None of us were sure what brought it on, perhaps it was the fact her siblings were getting older and one in bad health but we all obliged her. We agreed it would be the Sunday before Christmas as my sisters all had families and in-laws and other commitments for Christmas Eve and Christmas Day as well as our whole family get together. I remember when she called me to finalize everything like it was yesterday and her exact words were "Now Deidre I expect you to dress properly for church as I do your sisters." I didn't need to ask as I knew it was no slip of the tongue.

It was a lovely day with just Mom and her 4 daughters. We went to mass and out for breakfast then back to Mom's place where we exchanged small presents amongst each other as well as reminisced about Christmas' past. My fondest memory of all from that day though is a picture we took of the 5 of us dressed in our Sunday finest, that is after I figured out the self timer on my camera. After I had it developed, this was the olden days when we used real film, I had 8 X 10's printed for each of us. I still have that picture and it has been in a frame on my desk at home ever since.

We did the same thing every Christmas thereafter while Mom was still alive and have continued the tradition just us 4 sisters after her passing. I have all the pictures from those days as well and all are special to me but that first one is extra special. That is my fondest Christmas memory.

I have to be honest here, a lot of my Christmas memories are not the best. My birthday is close to Christmas so I always had a lot of those combination gifts, I would get things for my birthday and people would say now that is your Christmas present too. So then Christmas would come and I would feel slighted. Then, also, my parents sold appliances and when I got older we had deliveries on Christmas Eve and Christmas morning. Everything from stereo systems and tv’s to washers and dryers. I’m still a bit of a Scrooge when it comes to Christmas.

Later on, after I was married we were always ending up having to travel for the holidays to one families place or the other and there always seemed to be a lot of pressure that went with that. Then after our first was born when she was three, we stayed home for Christmas for the first time. It was such a treat to see her coming down the hall and then seeing the treeing and all the presents and how wide eyed she got when she saw that doll she wanted sitting under the tree with the big bow on it. Then how she tore open all the other presents and how she spent so time playing with the boxes and wrapping paper. We had to keep some of that around for a week because she kept playing with it.

Mine were when I was a small child and mother would take me down town St. Louis and that's when all the big dept. stores would make up all the huge window displays for Christmas.

I could spend all day just watching all the electric trains running in this huge display maybe 5 or 6 going all over the place and everything was timed.

To this day I can still see them

My fondest Christmas memory would have to be Christmas of 1986. I had been estranged from my family after I told them of the choices I had made and my plans for my life. After a while my brother contacted me and we began getting back together. In the summer of 1986 my mother was diagnosed with breast cancer and underwent a mastectomy. My brother informed me and I went to see her out of concern. It was the first step into a reconciliation, though a tenuous one with some of the family. Christmas that year was the first one Diana had been welcome at and she happily went. It was the whole family, 3 of my grandparents were still alive at the time and they were there as was my 1st husband although at the time we were just engaged. I haven't clue as to what we talked about or what physical presents I got but I got the best Christmas present I could have ever wished for being there with my family and fiancée.

Sadly it was the only one like that as my mother passed away the following fall. It wasn't the breast cancer that got her, she had a heart attack in her sleep and never woke up. Still every year as Christmas nears I think about that one special Christmas I had with the entire family and I thank God for giving me that special day.