H is for the Happiness with all the Family

With Christmas well and truly over for another year, my first reaction is always one of surprise when people say "thank god that's over" or "I've always hated Christmas". And then I remember that I had an inordinately happy childhood, with Christmas an exaggerated extension of that happiness. So, that even 25 years on, as soon as the nights start to draw in, or there's a hint of cold in the air (I am a child of the Northern Hemisphere after all), or Christmas lights go up in the street I start to get a warm fuzzy happy feeling. And these memories carry that feeling on through the festive season and out the other end of New Year's Eve.

Memories such as;
Ireland:

• No school for ages (2 weeks)
  Singing Christmas songs (with subliminal grammatical messages) in the car on the way home from nanas ("Capital C is for the Candy trimmed around the Christmas tree")


• Me (ever the night owl) waking Dee, Phil & then us all trying to wake Joe (from his coma-like sleep-ever the narcoleptic) at God-forsaken hours of Christmas morning (3, 4, 5am?!) to see what Santa brought


• Eating exotic foods like corn-on-the-cob with real melted butter & Streets Viennetta and sneaking brussel sprouts on to Phil's plate (or into the fire, behind the briquettes) while Mam & dad were not looking


• Dee & Me helping Joe & Phil assemble Castle Greyskull & Snake Moutain (Snake Moutain far superior with its secret-trap-door thing)


• Wonderful presents from Santa- Girl's World, Ballerina Cindy (about 20 dolls), skates, large baby dolls & a homemade doll's house (no points for guessing the theme here)


• the synthetic tree with flashing lights- seemed huge at the time


• watching the Wizard of Oz and being overtly afraid of The Wicked Witch & her "Fly My Pretties" flying monkeys and secretly afraid of the tin man (am I the only one who thought him kinda creepy?)


• falling asleep in aforementioned car and having mam or dad carry you into the house (thanks to J-Le for invoking this particular memory)


• Showing off presents to our cousins at number 12


• receiving those Cadbury stockings from granddad where every bar of chocolate was real size, not fun size and getting to eat the whole bar by yourself


• Being unable to sleep Christmas Eve out of sheer excitement


• Queuing up for hours in the cold to see the Christmas Windows at Switzers (?)


• Mam going on her bus trip to Newry to the presents cheaper and us not guessing she was getting the presents for Santa too


• rushing in, early Christmas morning, to show Mam & Dad the wonderful Fisher Price school set Santa brought and wondering why they weren't quite as surprised & delighted as we were


• large tins of Quality Street. Say no more


• Joe getting a toy tractor & trailer big enough to fit baby Phil in. Until it came unhinged and baby Phil fell out

Australia

• No school for ages (6 weeks)


• packing everything up into the camper van & heading off on family adventures via the caravan parks of Victoria, New South Wales & if lucky Queensland


• BBQs in the torrential rain


• going to the beach on Christmas Day just so we could tell everyone back in Ireland we'd been to the beach on Christmas Day


• Chocolate Christmas pudding


• Board games after dinner, in particular Trivial Pursuit where we never knew any answers to questions that started "which Australian...?"


• Carols by Candlelight on the TV


• those couple of years that we tried Secret Santa among the family members and I got Dad one year and thought it would be clever to hide his presents and leave treasure hunt style clues for him


• Phone calls to/from Ireland at odd hours where Dad would occasionally attempt to address the problem of 40 mins of "What time is it there", "What's the temperature?", "I'll put you on to..." & "Sure, this must be costing you a fortune" by giving us all specific topics to discuss


• Standing at midnight mass where no musical expense was spared with that woman and her tambourine coming in on Verse 2 and unusual harmonies


• Phil & I killing ourselves laughing at the aforementioned woman


• cooking a full Christmas dinner in 40+ heat

And many, many others that Mam, Dad, Dee, Joe & Phil can probably relate to, but not really anyone else. So, Mam, Dad, Dee, Joe & Phil, Happy New Year & all together now:

"(Capital) C is for the Candy trimmed around the Christmas Tree
H is for the Happiness with all the family
R is for the Reindeers prancing by the window pane
I is for the Icing on a cake, a sweet and sugar cake
S is for the stocking on the chimney wall
T is for the Toys beneath the Tree so Tall
M is for the Mistletoe where everyone gets kissed
A is for the Angels who make up the Christmas list
S is for old Santa who makes every kid his pet
Be good and he'll bring you everything in your Christmas Alphabet

(repeat 'til you fall asleep in the car)