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Let’s play.

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I’m running out of reasons, just do it.

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I used to adore Christmas and everything about it. I decorated everything that stood still, cooked huge meals, bought carloads of gifts and wrote so many cards my fingers cramped.

Over the years our celebrations have gotten smaller and quieter. No more big get togethers, less decorating, no rampant overspending. And that’s fine.

I’ve gotten to the age where very little of it matters anymore and though at times I miss the fun… more often than not the holiday itself makes me sad, missing those no longer with us. Five of our yearly family guests are gone now, we lost two just this summer. Death is a part of life, yes. But it makes for a very empty table.

Okay, that was depressing .… back to the question.

Favorite traditions:

When I was a child …

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A wee bit older than that, it was spending the day in NYC with my father. Every year he took me to his office where all the partners gave me little gifts. We ate lunch at the Bankers Club at 120 Broadway where he snuck me into the gentlemen only grill room. Even my mother hadn’t been there. The Rockefeller Center ice rink, Fifth Avenue shop windows, FAO Schwartz, the glorious tree. New York is a magical place for a child that time of year and I have lovely memories.

Years later when I married my husband? Hunting for and cutting down a tree. It has to be full, fat and perfect, as well as too big for the living room.

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Snuggling on the couch with a cup of hot chocolate watching It’s A Wonderful Life. It’s not Christmas without Jimmy Stewart.

Driving around town on Xmas Eve looking at lights and eating Chinese food … because I need a break from the kitchen and it’s always the only thing open.

How about you?

What’s your favorite Christmas tradition…

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46 thoughts on “Let’s play.”

  1. Watching as many Christmas/Christmas related movies (we are seeing a retro White Christmas showing in the local art house tomorrow), It’s a wonderful life, Gremlins, A Christmas Story, Babes in Toyland (Laurel & Hardy Version), A Muppet Christmas Carol, Home Alone, Elf, Die Hard & The Thin Man (both take place around Christmas) & Hit the ice with Abbott & Costello (feels like a Christmas movie but isn’t), The animated 1960’s Grinch & Charlie Brown Christmas. Doing Christmas shows (Usually Christmas Carol, this year we opted for Holiday Pops at Allentown Symphony) Making art or food as gifts, creating thr old school annual Christmas card, making brunch for the in-laws on Christmas day but this year my wife has to work, so I am volunteering my time as an assistant to the assistant activities director at Mosser Nursing Home. 😁😇

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    2. If you have a smart tv, the Christmas Plus channel is showing more than half of those movies. The original Miracle on 34th Street is currently on, then White Christmas, A Christmas Story, It’s A Wonderful Life, remake of Miracle,Holiday Inn, Bishop’s Wife, …

      I love seeing them in theaters, where you can see more detail!

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  6. I do not celebrate holidays, especially religious holidays, but all holidays nonetheless. I hate that people need to have a special day to do what we should be doing evety day of our lives.

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  8. As a kid we would always drive around on Xmas Eve looking at all the holiday lights and displays. Now it seems like nobody wants to do it anymore. Lately, I’ve just been going out with me and the dogs. They aren’t that impressed either but I make them go anyway.

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  9. Baking Christmas cookies with my mom and now my boys. Going up onto Scenic Drive to see the Holiday lights from the cliffside and then going downtown to have peppermint hot chocolate and a hot dog with my parents as a kid while I waited my turn to see Santa in his castle in the plaza in the middle of downtown.

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  11. I used to watch IAWL every year, many times. Back when it was public domain and on multiple channels, my sister yelled at me to stop watching it. Then I got depressed and couldn’t eatch it. This year, I’ve already seen it 3 times.

    I like to listen to my cd of The Grinch, the original one, which includes all the dialog and has liner notes of song lyrics. Dunno where that is now.

    I try to eat snowball/wedding cookies

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  13. Decorating the tree has to be right up there as far as a favorite tradition. Mrs. Chess and I have gotten a live tree every year together, and it is always cool bringing them inside each year and decorating them up.

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  14. The Santa photo is everything; you are a doll. Then and now.
    My best memories of Christmas were of my Grandparents and Uncle arriving at our home with a trunk full of gifts and just having them at our house for the next day or so. I didn’t have a lot of consistency as a kid, but the seven years of that happening each year still makes my heart flutter.

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