Holiday Sampler

These holiday stories represent a sampling from a paperback and eBook created by Ariele Huff with and for her writing students. Ariele is a writing teacher and Northwest Prime Time writing columnist.

A Family Tradition

In my family, even if the wrappings were falling off, we wouldn’t dream of opening a present before the appropriate date and time. I had my kids convinced it was a universal law, so this is how we operated all through their growing up years. On Christmas morning, we took it several steps further. Everyone was present and had a cup of eggnog before the gifts were parceled out, one at a time. Each was opened for all to see and express appropriate admiration and appreciation. If the gift was wearable, the receiver might even go try it on while the rest waited. We had nothing but time.

Imagine her shock and disappointment when daughter Kerry discovered that some families do holidays differently. She was spending time with her new inlaws on Christmas Day when, to her amazement, all hell broke loose. At a prescribed time—they probably tooted a whistle—everyone dove under the tree and grabbed and ripped open their gifts. It was all over in about two minutes...all that planning, shopping, wrapping. Oh my.

The mess was, of course, horrendous—nobody knew who had gotten what or from whom. My daughter told me later that this family was like a bunch of animals!

And what about the homemade eggnog? Ours was rich and fabulous and took several bowls of all sizes, much whipping, and was lots of work and prep time. It had to be done or we’d starve during the opening of the presents. Depending on the number and ages of the children “helping,” we usually pretty much trashed the kitchen with this project.

Now that I think about it, one family’s mess is another family’s tradition. So what do we do? We just enjoy.

--Lois (Mike) Caslin

Sharing Holidays

One of my most memorable Christmases was the first one Larry and I spent together. He was raised in the Jewish faith, and although he was 29, 1982 was his first Christmas. It was also my first taste of Hanukkah.

I was raised in a home where Christmas was a big celebration. Tinsel, angels, holly wreaths and the smell of baking cookies filled our house from late November to early January. I had heard things about Jewish traditions and customs, but somehow I’d always assumed that everyone celebrates Christmas!

Larry was not as naïve as I, but he did find a large difference between being on the outskirts of a holiday and being in the middle of all the festivities. What an exciting time it was for both of us and especially for my twelve-year-old daughter, Kristi. She had heard only a little about Hanukkah at school from friends and from television, so she had a lot of questions. Many of these were even hard for Larry to answer. Getting deeper into the meanings of Hanukkah led naturally to discoveries about the significance of Christmas traditions, as well.

Larry was delighted with the Christmas decorations, shopping for gifts and all the Christmas goodies. I did some background work and read, for the first time, the story of Hanukkah. My daughter learned about the Menorah and the “shamus,” the candle that lights the others nightly for eight days.

Kristi and I liked the dreidels (spinning tops), the latkes (potato pancakes), the blintzes and the knishes, but our favorites were Hallah (a golden bread) and Mandelbrot (almond cookie).

As he loves to sing, Larry enjoyed the carols the best, but he also thoroughly liked the plum pudding and turkey dressing.

My favorite moment was on Christmas Eve. Larry had been gazing at the lighted tree with shining eyes and confessed to us what I had guessed all along—that this was his first up-close experience with Christmas.

For Larry and I, sharing our traditions was a wonderful experience that caused us to learn and think more about our own faiths and customs. We began to look at these things through each other’s eyes without taking them for granted.

From then on, we celebrated both Christmas and Hanukkah each year— continually finding new delights in the richness and joyfulness of these holidays.

--Wendy M. Adams

Norwegian Christmas

My Norwegian grandparents lived only four blocks away. My family (three children and parents) could walk there from our home. Christmas time was special—the same celebration year after year. Grandmother worked for weeks ahead of time, baking all those tasty Norwegian cookies, including sandkaker— made by pressing the soft tasty dough using a thumb to push it into a metal form. Another cookie was fattigmann, which means “poor boy” in Norwegian. This cookie is diamond shaped with a cut in the center pulled through (a knot). With krumkaker, the dough is rolled. The name gives it away—it crumbles when you even touch one.

I remember hearing that Norwegian women were supposed to know how to bake five kinds of cookies. My grandmother made them all. At Christmastime, you can find cookies like these at Larsen’s Bakery 8000 24th Ave NW in the Ballard area of Seattle. Going there brings back all the memories of childhood and the Christmas Eve dinners my grandmother prepared.

We opened our presents on Christmas Eve. My cousin was always invited and always received a necktie and a box of handkerchiefs. I remember we put up a tree three days before Christmas and it stayed until New Year’s Day.

After a wonderful dinner, we sometimes had lutefisk. We poured hot butter over it to make it tastier. Our feast was like Norwegians in Norway had.

We played whist (a card game) after eating. I still recall all the good times we had at my grandparents’ house at Christmas time.

--Don Sivertsen

Our First Christmas Tree

What a funny looking tree! It was the first tree I remember our family having. We did not have room for one when we lived in a chicken house in the country during the war. When I was 12, we finally got a house built for our family of five. We were so happy to have a big window to put the tree in front of, but we had no lights to put on it. We went ahead and decorated it with all the ornaments and tinsel. Later, our music teacher gave us a string of lights. What a mess we made putting the lights on with all the tinsel in the way, but it was far too much work to take it all off until the lights were on. We learned it was better to always put the lights on first.

My sister and I had a tradition of waking up Christmas morning and finding a small gift from a friend and taking it back to bed to open. The house was cold, for the fire had not been stoked, but the bed was nice and warm. We had to wait for our grandparents to come before we could open the rest of the presents. It was so good to have a big house we could scamper around in. I could make a circular path from one room to another. There were a lot of things to be thankful for our first Christmas in our big house. No more trips to grandparents to bathe or outhouse to visit.

--Pat Beaudry

Santa Claus

The age of seven should have been plenty of time to realize that Santa Claus was a figment of someone’s active mind. Living where it was very cold in New Hampshire, I almost believed that the Christmas spider came in and spun webs around our tree for decorations. Of course I knew it was tinsel. My two-year-old brother was in the beginning throes of believing in Santa, reindeer and all the wonders of Christmas. I must admit I still wanted to believe, but when my mother gave me a dollar to go to the village and buy several toys to put into his stocking, my beliefs all crashed. There was no Santa Claus. BUT WAIT—where had the two books about the Bobbsey twins come from?

--Connie Campbell

Dear Readers from Ariele:

I’ve always loved holidays and celebrations. As a child, I decorated my room especially for Christmas. My indulgent grandfather learned I used my allowance to buy small trees, and he provided me with a complete selection of pink ornaments one year and all silver and gold ones the next year. As a teacher, I’ve held many class parties and heard a lot of delightful stories about how others commemorate their holidays. I hope they make you feel as jolly as they do me. --Ariele Huff

Thanks to Ariele and her writing students for this holiday sampler. To find the full book, visit www.amazon.com/dp/B01MTK90AG. Ariele teaches onsite writing classes in the Seattle area and online classes to people all over the world. For more information, visit http://arielewriter.myfreesites.net". Email her for a complete list of class titles or with any writing questions you have: ariele@comcast.net