Christmas Memories

I can't believe that Christmas is almost here!!! Is it me or does the space between Thanksgiving and Christmas keep getting shorter? If I can just make it through next week....then I'm off for a week! I'm so looking forward to going home, catching up with people, and not doing anything on a schedule and celebrating Christmas with the people that I love the most.

Christmas always gets me all nostalgic, so I thought that I would take a stroll down memory lane with some of my fave Christmas memories (these are no order!)

1. Black Friday Christmas shopping. Ever since I was a baby, my mom, me, my aunts and my Mee Maw would hit the mall, dressed in our Christmas sweatshirts and Christmas socks. ( I know, dorky!) We sit up the night before and map out all the sales.

2. Being on TV when I was like 4 or 5 while we were Black Friday shopping. My mom and Aunt Jane chased the camera guy around until he put me on TV. It was the year that the cabbage patch dolls were all the rage.

3. Christmas Morning breakfast casserole with cranberry juice. Oh so yummy!

4. Going for breakfast with my parents on Christmas eve morning.

5. The year that we almost didn't have Christmas Eve- the big freeze. It came a huge freeze and my Maw-Maw's pipes froze. I think we ended up having ham sandwiches.

6. We used to always have Christmas at my grandparents and they would always have a tree. Well, I was 9 years old and it like 3 days before Christmas and they didn't have their tree up yet. Maw Maw said that she didn't think they would put one out that year. I was horrified! Christmas Eve rolled around and there was a tree!!! My Maw-maw, who was well into her 70's at the time, had gone into the woods behind the house and cut down a pine tree and decorated it. Now, it looked like the Charlie Brown tree, but that is one of my favorite memories!

7. Making candy with my mom.

8. Going shopping with my dad for my mom's present.

9. Adopting a family for Christmas and going shopping for them.

10. Our church did an outdoor living nativity scene. It was soooo cold. It came time for the wisemen to get ready to go out and no one could find them. They were sitting in one of men's Lincoln town car with the heater on! That was the year that the Wise Men came to Bethelem in a town car.

11. Another time during the pageant, it was so cold that the seats froze! The wind was so brutal and bone chilling. I was the angel on top of the manger scene--I almost fell off because the wind was so strong!

12. Going with my church to look at the Christmas lights and ending up in the ghetto.

13. Another time at the pageant, I played Mary. I had to dance around. I kept praying that my "belly" wouldn't fall out. It was interesting to say the least.

14. Going to the tree farm to cut the tree and hearing my dad gripe the whole time there. (if it were up to him, we wouldn't have a tree! He hates putting it up.)

15. Going to the Christmas pageant at First Baptist Zachary with my mom and grandmother.

16. Christmas eve service

17. the Lottie Moon post office at church

18. going to the nursing home with my GA group

19. making christmas ornaments

20. watching Christmas movies

What are some your favorite memories?