My best gift

And the Grinch, with his Grinch-feet ice cold in the snow, stood puzzling and puzzling, how could it be so? It came without ribbons. It came without tags. It came without packages, boxes or bags. And he puzzled and puzzled 'till his puzzler was sore. Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn't before. What if Christmas, he thought, doesn't come from a store. What if Christmas, perhaps, means a little bit more.

~Dr. Seuss

We always open our gifts, just the four of us, a couple of days before Christmas. This started a few years ago - mainly because the big "family" Christmas has gotten so HUGE that we want to save a little time. One year, for example, we got so exhausted after opening gifts on Christmas Eve for 3 hours that we took a meal break before we finished the other half..... and the family has GROWN since then!

So, we opened our gifts last night, on the Winter Solstice. My sons helped me light every candle in the house (part of the Solstice tradition -- a way of encouraging the light to return and summer to come once again). To the gentle strains of "Jingle Bells" and "O, Holy Night", basking in the glow of the tree and the Vikings/Packers game, we sat in our living room and opened gifts.

When we were all done and the boys had disappeared upstairs to play their new video games and call their friends I finally had time take it all in. I snuggled up to my husband, gave him a big hug, and looked into his eyes. In all honesty I said, "Do you know what my BEST gift this year was? It was getting to stay home and take care of you guys."

With tears in his eyes, my darling husband said, "I was going to say that was MY best gift!"

You can't do better than that!

Merry Christmas