The 12 Days of Christmas: CHRISTMAS COUNTDOWN!

I think it would be fun to have a countdown to Christmas and every day from here on out post things/stories about Christmas that I love and remember. So here we go..

DAY 1- My personal Christmas Eve Memories...

I am going to start by saying I grew up in a very small town called Pleasant Hill. In this town, the only really memorable thing to outsiders is a statue of a soldier that is in the center of town. To this day I am not really sure what or who that soldier is, maybe the founder of the town. The main streets are lined with old Victorian homes, and I think many years ago it was chosen as one of the "best small towns to live in" by some national group. It is quiet, surrounded by farms, and a very safe and I suppose somewhat idyllic place to grow up.

Anyway, every year at Christmas time, we would go visit a local popular holiday spot. The Ludlow Falls Lights, pictured above. If my memory serves me correctly (mine is horrible), these lights were accented by a walking path that had all sorts of lit up things to enjoy, and at the end there was a large bon fire to gather around, and I feel like people would drink hot chocolate and chat around it. This was part of many of our years Christmas Eve activities. On that night we would of course act out the Nativity story, and for many years we didn't have a boy to play the innkeeper (our only brother came last- when I was 14 years old!) so I remember my Sis Amelia always playing the boy parts- and we'd always draw a mustache on her with black eyeliner- and then we'd wrap her long brown hair around her chin in a pony tail like a beard. That always got us giggling. My dad would make his yummy buckeyes for treats, and my mom always made tons of delectable foods to eat.

We'd read out of the scriptures as well, and often times we'd perform some musical thing for our parents. We all played instruments, I played the flute and piccolo, my sister the oboe, and we also played the piano, and sang. It was kind of like a scene out of "Little Women", since there were 5 girls in our family, and I know my mother often said we reminded her of that.

We loved to dance and be silly so any family event usually included some form of silliness.

After all the activity, we would sit down around the Christmas tree, one of our two, and one by one we'd open our gifts to each other, as well as from our parents. We were not the rip and roar kind of present openers. It was one at a time, each present being given every one's attention.

And as I remember it, that was how Christmas Eve went at our house. Santa always came the next morning. I remember those days with fondness, as I try to create similar memories for my children even now.