I remember Christmas when I was young. I wasn’t most excited about the family and company I kept, but I was more excited about who got me what. Of course, me as a young person was more concerned about what was given to me and how much. Growing up as a twin, I made sure to keep tabs on who got which amount. I wasn’t about to be gypped – especially when I’m in competition with my literal other half.
But, as we grew older, we both moved out of the house and then we both moved back. My twin had a son and a few years later I had a daughter. The focus turned away from getting presents for me, but spoiling my nephew and my daughter absolutely rotten.
Things changed even more when I moved out of my house into a new apartment with my fiance. We had to figure out holidays since we were sharing them now – it was difficult. Thankfully we have families that understand and we split Christmas pretty well between the two families. It was decided that we would spend Christmas Eve over at my mom’s and then, after my honey got off work at 4, we would head over to his mom’s for Christmas festivities.
That’s beside the point though. After my mom came to get my sister and me, I went into her living room to put our presents underneath the tree. I went into the room, trying my best to barricade myself against dog and nephew (who was eager to see the presents underneath for him) and was shocked to see the amount of presents underneath the tree. In the history of Christmas’ with my mom there had never been this many.
I put my gifts underneath the tree and went with my mom to get some last-minute Christmas stuff. Every year I make a dessert and strata for Christmas morning so we got the ingredients for me to make some. But things were definitely different this year.
For one, I worked retail this year. It’s definitely different when you work at an actual gift shop instead of a clothing store. Another thing, I work in a mall. The two combined plus college got me working over 42 hours a week and left me absolutely exhausted by the end of it.
I had made a cheesecake for my fiance’s family dinner and was planning on making one for my mom’s Christmas too. I had brought over all the ingredients to make the cheesecake, but was too exhausted to make another cheesecake and was thankful when my mom told me I really didn’t have to make a cheesecake this year.
That left the Christmas strata. My mom and I got everything needed at the store, and I most definitely had plans to fulfill my Christmas tradition. But, with my fiance having to leave bright and early the next morning for his 7:30am to 4:00pm Christmas shift, we got to open his presents early and found out we got the game Munchkin. If you don’t know what Munchkin is, you should buy it and play it because you won’t regret it. All of us (there were six of us) sat around the table to play the game. Even my mom, who normally doesn’t get involved in these types of games, joined in. It meant so much to see my mom at least try to participate (she quit after a good length of time)! We lost track of time and before we knew it, it was midnight and we were all exhausted. We ended up going to bed right away because my honey had to get up in six hours. So – no strata.
That morning I felt guilty for not only ruining Christmas dessert but for also ruining our Christmas breakfast. My fiance left for work and the rest of us gathered in the living room to open all the presents Santa had left for everyone. We distributed the presents fairly waiting for each person to open one of their gifts before the next opened theirs. But my mom quickly realized that my twin got more loot than I did. Apologizing profusely, she mentioned how she didn’t realize how that happened. She tried to make it fair.
For once, I didn’t care though. I told her it wasn’t a big deal and meant it. For I realized this Christmas – my best Christmas ever, although I messed up the dessert and the breakfast, I didn’t get many gifts, and most of our traditions were ruined this year, the night was filled with joyous laughter, inside jokes, family, and above all else, love. I didn’t need to be spoiled for Christmas to enjoy it. I enjoyed it because everyone loved their gifts and everyone had a fun time.
My mom managed to save breakfast – sort of. She decided to take the bread that we were going to use in the strata to make french toast but realized we didn’t have any syrup so we had fried bread for breakfast. I still got to see my family and my honey’s family and came home happy to have been apart of family gatherings. Merry belated Christmas to my readers and I hope your day was as blessed as mine was.
Eat, Sleep, Love, Repeat 