I do not remember the presents I got when I was little. I do remember there would be just one. Aunt Pearl would usually come through with a bottle of fingernail polish or coloring book.
But I do remember the Christmas programs at school and church, Christmas Eve at my Grandma Osnes’s and how my mom took the holiday over after Grandma moved to an apartment. We had the biggest house, so with all the aunts, uncles, cousins, and neighbors it made sense.
Grandma O. always had a real tree with candles on it. She would keep the tree in the parlor where is was cool. We would look at it through the little panes of glass on the sliding doors that closed off the cold part of the house. On Christmas Eve we would all bundle up, get in the old car, and drive down that hilly S.D. road that led to Grandma’s house. The house was not particularly big, and it would be packed with people. Before the night was over, the kids would line up to say their “pieces” from school and church. That was a little nerve wracking! Then the appearance of the tree would come. It was pulled out from the corner, the candles lit, and we would walk around the tree, singing every Christmas carol we knew. I remember staring at those little candles, as they flickered in the tree. Sometimes we would need two circles to go around the tree, there were so many of us. After the candles on the tree were put out, we would gather around the piano. Cousin Mildred would play and we sang every Christmas song in the hymn book. We ate Norweigen cookies and played “Whose got the button?,” which consisted of a button on a string that was long enough to circle all the kids and some grownups who were trying to keep the game under control. When it finally got late, the kids would crawl on the bed, snuggle under the coats and sleep until the parents loaded us up in the cold car!
Christmas is to celebrate Jesus’s birth, be with family and friends, and make memories that make you smile 65 years later.
~Teena Toliver, Churdan
