Mama Says: Christmas with Jackie

...On Friday....I'm helping Aleta out this week.

I don’t think anyone enjoyed Christmas like Jackie. The first year we were married, we went to his parent’s house on Christmas Eve and had presents there. After it was all over, we then went to his oldest sister’s house to watch her children open presents. On the way home that night he explained that we would get up early on Christmas morning and go to his other sister’s house to eat breakfast and watch her kids open their presents. And then back to his parent’s house for Christmas lunch. Whoa!! Where did that leave time for my family? And furthermore, how would that affect our children if we ever had any? We came to the conclusion that some of that would have to change. Fast forward a few years, and we had our first child. Jackie’s idea of appropriate gifts for this child was a little crazy at times. Prime example, a shriner’s parade model-T car that he had repainted and had Punky’s Putt-Putt written on the sides. She was two years old. It was freezing that Christmas morning. He had her out in that car that morning. He turned the steering wheel where it would go in a circle. She rode for hours in that car, going in circles in our front yard.

He did wait until she was a couple of years old before he started waking her up at 4:00 or 4:30, telling her Santa had come. He would get up, turn on the tree lights, then go wake her up. I tried to tell him that was not a good idea, he was starting a bad habit. Sure enough, every year after the kids got old enough to wake up on their own, they always got up very early, but he had always beat them up and turned on the tree lights. And he was always ready to get up and watch them open their presents. Jackie exuded Christmas joy, cheer and excitement.

Christmas hasn’t been the same. We still continue to get up early. Now that Rheba is working night shift, I wonder how this will affect our morning routine. She doesn’t normally get home until 8:30 or after, and it just won’t seem right waiting until then to open presents. I wonder if Santa could let me catch up on some lost sleep from all those past early Christmas mornings?