Christmas Spirit

The most wonderful time of the year has been ... wonderful! It seemed especially important to me this year to be sure to practise all of our family traditions, to remind Sam as often as possible that Christmas is a time to be conscious of how lucky we are to be together, to be grateful for what we have, and to share our good fortune with others.

This year, I was able to tell Sam the real reason for the "Help Santa Toy Parade," which we've donated to every year, sometimes bringing a gift for the toy mountain float and sometimes dropping loonies and toonies into the boots of passing fireman (He's pictured here with a toonie headed for a boot!). Sam seemed especially pleased to know that we were helping to make Christmas morning brighter for families who cannot afford to place a Santa gift under the tree. We also shopped together for a gift for Stuart, an 8-year-old boy whose name I pulled from the Christmas Wish Cloud list at work. And we donated to the Food Bank through Carleton Heights, so that less fortunate families could be sure to enjoy a nice meal together.

Christmas tree decorating was lovely, too. First, we had our annual visit to Tracey's so that Sam can join the cousins in decorating their tree. Two weeks later, we hauled a strapping Norfolk Pine home from the market, laid out all the ornaments and recounted what things came from where as we (mostly Sam!) added them to the tree. Sipping egg nog and listening to carols, we agreed, as we always do, that this was the best tree yet. It's beautiful! We've also added a few nutcrackers to Sam's collection. He loves them, and can often be overheard lining them up for nutty adventures.

In the evenings since the tree went up, we've been reading Christmas stories together and watching classic Christmas movies. Sometimes Sam even reads to me while I make dinner—he read No Room at the Inn last night, while I made chicken quesadillas. "This is why we have an angel on the tree," he said. "It's part of the Christmas story." Right now, he's reading The Night Before Christmas to Jeremy. His stack of stories grows larger each year, and getting through them all before Christmas is part of the fun!

Jeremy and I squeezed into the back of the Carleton Heights gymnasium to watch Sam perform three songs during The Holiday Concert — "Catch a Falling Star," "This Little Light of Mine," and "Jouer au Hockey." While that was, of course, the highlight of the concert, the rest of the show wasn't too shabby either! We also saw the final performance of the Ottawa Little Theatre's Inspecting Carol, a farce about a small theatre company disastrously staging Dickens' classic. The ride home took us through the downtown core, which was alight with thousands of lights.

And we've enjoyed the company of friends, too: a big dinner party at the Morley in early December, an annual affair at the Yates' complete with a musical performance, a Cookie Exchange and party at Debbie's, and a Morley & dogs drop-in to give Sam his present and to bestow the traditional tins of delicious homemade chocolates and cookies.

That's not to say there's been no talk of presents, of course. We've enjoyed the whispered conversations, the secret wrapping, the discovery of just the right gift for one another. Sam's crawled right under the very boughs to inspect packages, wonder at their contents. (Always a cute sight.) But he talks as much about what he's giving as what he might be getting, and that makes me happy.

In short, it's been a wonderful month, and the long (and long-awaited) Christmas vacation together is just getting underway. Merry Christmas!