“Merry Christmas” Chapter 111

I love the holiday season - starting with Thanksgiving and all the way through to New Year’s. People in general seem happier during this time. Put on a Christmas song and you just can’t stay grumpy. As a matter of fact, I think Christmas music is the only genre of music you can put on in the office and everyone sings along. If you turn on any other music, someone will complain. For me, every holiday is a little extra special now. I enjoy every day, but the holidays, surrounded by family, make my heart sing songs not found on any radio or music channel.

I've known since childhood that Christmas represents the birth of Christ. However, since I wasn't raised in church, Christmas was always more about Santa Claus. I don’t really remember too many Christmases where I was super excited about gifts and Santa. I do have some happy memories, though. One of the oldest memories I have was going to the Moose Club where my grandpa dressed up as Santa for the Christmas party. He did a great job and he didn’t require any extra padding. 🎅 I also remember the night before Christmas when my mom would lock the bedroom door with string so we wouldn’t sneak out and look at the gifts Santa brought.

When Laura and I got married, one of the biggest things we wanted to do was make Christmas memories and create/pass down traditions for our children. I wanted them to not just have a few memories, but rather I wanted them to fill a book and be able to continue the traditions. There were years I dressed up like Santa and placed gifts under the tree. Baking and decorating cookies for Santa. Gifting individual ornaments each year to each child, who would eventually take them with them when they start their own families. Decorating inside and outside to the max; giving our kids a winter wonderland. 

Laura grew up with a lot of faith, and Christmas was focused around Jesus and the arrival of the kings. The importance of the season outweighed the importance of Santa. One of Laura's fondest memories is a tradition her mom gifted to Laura and her siblings. They had a manger with a removable little baby Jesus. Mom would pick one of the kids to watch Him and not tell anyone they were taking care of Him. On Christmas Day, baby Jesus was placed in the manger and the guardian would be revealed. We carried this tradition forward with our family, and we always say that Jesus is the reason for the season.

We have made sure to blend together over the years to keep our family grounded in faith and fun, while coming up with some new traditions and continuing others. Today we spend our days sharing stories of Christmases past, and we'll keep doing so until the day our grandchildren are here to create new memories. Laura still decorates the inside and our kids have replaced me and have taken over the outside decorations. Santa still makes his stop here because if you don’t believe, you don’t receive; and of course baby Jesus still arrives on Christmas.

I will FIGHT every day to ensure I am here for many more Christmas seasons, and I plan to keep creating more memories. I pray for all of you to keep fighting too. For all of you who have lost loved ones, I pray for your peace the season.

• Merry Christmas 

• French: Joyeux Noël 

• German: Frohe Weihnachten 

• Spanish: Feliz Navidad 

• Italian: Buon Natale 

• Portuguese: Feliz Natal 

• Dutch: Vrolijk kerstfeest 

• Romanian: Crăciun fericit 

• Polish: Wesołych świąt Bożego Narodzenia 

• Swedish: God Jul 

• Czech: Veselé Vánoce 

• Greek: Καλά Χριστούγεννα! 

• Hawaiian: Mele Kalikimaka! 

• Irish: Nollaig Shona Duit 

• Japanese: ハッピークリスマス (Happīkurisumasu) 

• Thai: Suksun Wan Christmas 

• Welsh: Nadolig Llawen 

• Vietnamese: Chúc mừng Giáng sinh

Love and Blessings 

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