There Really is a Santa

I feel like a little girl again!

It has been a long time since I was really, I mean REALLY, excited about Christmas!  I have been living in Australia now for just over 16 years and I still can't get used to a hot Christmas.  It just doesn't seem normal to me.  That is not surprising since I spent 36 years having a very cold Christmas.



Growing up Christmas was a really special time in our family.  The whole family on my mom's side would get together every Christmas and have it together.  That is my immedicate family, my mom's parents and her 3 sisters with their families.  All my cousins on that side were female, so the men in the family were outnumbered!  We would gather at one house all of us, sleeping wherever we could find a spot.  My four cousins, my sister and I would always put on a play for the family and it was always the same play..."T'was the Night Before Christmas".  We had this play down pat!!  Each one of us had our part and over the years we became experts at playing those parts!



Marg-Rheta the little one in front

Each year we gave the part of ALL 12 reindeers to my youngest cousin Marg-Rheta!  That poor kid had to be outside and run past a window of whoever's house we were at, 12 times!!!  It didn't matter how cold it was outside she had to do it.  I think the coldest was about -35 celcius!!!  But she was a trooper and did it every year!  Or maybe we just bullied her into it!  But I have a family who embraces Christmas and what it means to have a family that loves each other. 

I can still remember Grandma with my dad, leading us in Christmas Carol's, and remember the one year Christmas was held at our house that the power went off.  How do you cook a 30lb turkey with no electricity.  Nothing to worry about...just wait six hours for the power to come back on, then eat late!  What to do in the meantime...have a few drinks in front of the fireplace!  Grandma got a bit tipsy, but boy could she dance and sing then!!  I will never forget her leading her daughters doing the can-can!  And Grandpa upset that "His Betty" was tipsy!

For the first time in 16 years I am going home for Christmas!  I am so excited because everyone is going to be at my sister's for Christmas dinner.  My parents, my sister and her children, my aunts and uncles, my cousins and their children.  The only sad thing is that Marg-Rheta won't be there as we lost her last year to cancer.  But I can see her so vividly as each reindeer, still in my mind and I can see her singing, with her most amazing voice.  I am sure that there will be tears and there will be laughs and through all of it Marg-Rheta will be there with us in spirit.

Repeating what I said as I opened this entry...I feel like a little girl again.  I haven't been this excited in a long, long time!  I feel like there really is a Santa this year!!!