Beneath the Wraps

We didn’t do our annual Christmas dinner last year (the one with mom and her children) – at least not with the same dishes we usually prepare.  We gathered at my one brother’s house and had soup and bread.  It was simple.  We played games and exchanged gifts. This year we didn’t even do a dinner. Each sib went his separate way.  We weren’t together for Christmas Eve or Christmas – not all four of us.  Corey had gone back to Las Vegas to be with his sweetheart and to register as a permanent residence of Las Vegas. Sunny and her youngest had run by mom’s house to drop off some gifts.  They were just in and out. Kayla and Bill had planned to visit with both families on Christmas Eve – but as we weren’t getting together as siblings, they chose to stop by mom’s on the way to spending Christmas Eve with his family.  And Roland, Jenna, Biff and I stayed with mom for four hours after everyone else had left.  Well, almost everyone. ...

          Family has grown.  We used to do a dinner on Christmas Eve. We would gather at the house where Aunt Gertrude and Uncle Ted live.  That was a tradition for years.  My grandma Helen and her three kids and their children - we started out with just three of us -  I was the eldest, then my cousin, Michelle, my brother Patrick and then Michelle’s brother came along.  It was another seven years before Edmund and Corey were born and then Rosa and then Kayla.            Daddy’s only sister, Chrissy got married to Kim.  Eventually they had four boys and the family continued to grow.  Both Patrick and Michelle found partners and married. And the family continued to grow.  It seemed like there were more people than room.  It got hard for Trudy to host not one, but two dinners each year.  Not that she was supplying all the food.  ...

          Each of us has traditions.  Many are the same.  Some vary. Some get lost.  Some don’t work.  A tradition may be carried on for generations. Some may brush away.           One of my favorite Christmas books is “God’s Vitamin C for the Christmas Spirit”  which shares stories, ideas, traditions and reasons.  One of the thoughts I read was written by Christi Anne Shepeard in which she shares a tradition of “The Jesus Sock”           The story unfolds that there is an extra sock in her possession – one that doesn’t match the other socks selected for each family member that year.  She decided to make it a sock for the Savior in which her family would write letters and insert them into the sock – every year.            I thought that sounded like a cool tra...

          We had an awesome program at Relief Society earlier this month. The theme was on the origins of Christmas – why we use various icons in our holiday celebration.           The star, the angels, the nativity . . . those I could figure out.  But where did Santa Clause come from?  Or Christmas lights? Or the candy cane – though growing up I had always believed that it was to represent the crooks of the shepherds who were “abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night”  but there’s actually more to it – or so goes the legend.            Origins have become fabricated over the centuries.  Or else the decorative plant life was adapted from pagan celebration and reasons were made to fit the Christian holiday – which (unfortunately) often gets overlooked about why we have a Christmas and why we started celebrating it ...

The thing I enjoyed most about Thanksgiving was that each year was spent with a different group of people than the year before – not always.  For the most part our Thanksgiving dinners were intimate.  10 -12 people.  Nothing overwhelming like the 30+ number that my neighbor from across the street likes to have.  The more, the merrier – or so is her opinion.  I prefer less people.           Sometimes we would enjoy the Thanksgiving holidays with various neighbors.  Sometimes extended family.  Sometimes just us.  Each one different.  Each one with positive memories.           I recall one year spending it with a couple who had two children.  I think mom and dad had only three at the time.  The movie, The Jazz Singer (the version with Neal Diamond as Jess Robin), had just gone to the dollar theatre.  It was part of a double feat...

          Since we were children, mom has made it a tradition to take each us out for lunch or dinner on his or her birthday.   I don’t know how old we were when the tradition started.   We used to go out as an entire family and gradually just the birthday child.           This continued for the grandchildren after Patrick and his wife started having children.   I remember going out with the oldest two with the entire family – which gradually turned into just Patrick’s family and then just the grandchild.             I know my youngest nephew was four when my mom took him out.   His mom and I just happened to be with them.   I don’t know where we went to eat (probably somewhere exciting – like McDonald’s) but I do remember him choosing a pair of green overall shorts that probably only fit him just that one day. ...