Put This Under My Tree, Please

I want a lot for Christmas this year.

My list is kind of long, but every item is exactly what I would choose if I could have just what I wanted.

Give me a box of hugs from my daughters, the surprise kind where they slip up beside me and share a quick squeeze.  Stick in my stocking the quick "I love you's" I send behind them as they head out the door to school each morning.

You can package together the driving lessons, the pile of basketball uniforms to be washed, and the stack of books to return to the library.

Just a small box will do for the conversations we share about boys - the nice guys, the thoughtful kind.  No need to give that topic too much importance just yet. ;)

All the sounds will need at least three packages. The large one should be the sound of music coming from the piano as my girls practice their Christmas songs.  The sound of my husband coming in the door each evening should be the special box with lots of hearts on it. It's one of those I look forward to every day.  Those after-school talks on my drives home with my girls will probably need to be squeezed into a pretty big container.

Why the big box of money?  That's to dole out for lunch money and school fundraisers and youth group activities and Starbucks drinks on a regular day, just because.

The next one I open will have all the smells...bacon 'cause it makes all the breakfasts better, a mixed scent of Bath and Body Works body sprays coming from both girls' bedrooms, my husband's new cologne.

There's an almost empty box since there haven't been any new hand-crafted ornaments made from hand prints or chip can tops or craft sticks put on my tree in quite awhile.  We're lacking in the glitter-encrusted, white-glue dripping kind.  Perhaps that season of life has passed us by....

Yes, a second empty box reminds me to check my closet for what might be missing since the last time a daughter borrowed it - the pair of shoes, the sweater, the necklace.

No need to wrap up those lunchboxes...they greet me early every morning as it is.

Bundle up the sound of the four of us talking around the supper table, riding in the car together, singing Christmas carols side by side in church, our relief at another annual family photo session completed.  Tuck in all four of our stockings, currently hung in the living room, anticipating their filling on Christmas Eve.

It's getting crowded under the tree, but I think there's room for a few more presents.

Gather the two leftover birthday cakes waiting on the counter, courtesy of two girls born two years and two days apart, early in December.  Those contact cases, bobby pins, and flatirons by the bathroom sink get a box all their own.

Give me that contented feeling of falling into bed beside my husband after another late night of ball games or recitals or concerts.  Let me watch another cheer routine, sit through another piano recital, watch another JV Girls basketball game, enjoy another band number,

Let me drive a daughter to one more party, buy her one more white elephant gift to exchange, pray another prayer perched on the side of her bed before she drifts off to sleep.

Make that final gift a box of tissues, 'cause at this point I'll be needing them.

The neat thing about this list is that it's what I already have.  Won't cost anyone a cent, but will be more treasured than anything that's frequently deposited on my front porch in a cardboard Amazon box. :)

Because these won't be the gifts of next Christmas.  Those will be different, because it will be 2017, and some things, even slightly, will have changed.  That's as it should be, and will bring its own joys, as God wills.  But these gifts are the gifts of the present, those to be held close to my heart.

These are the memories my family is making this Christmas season.  Yours are just as precious, because they're yours, and they may never be the same again.  What's a memory you want placed under your tree?

Related posts:
Are You Getting What You Want for Christmas?
3 Gifts I Want My Children to Receive This Christmas
To Simplify This Season...Or Not?

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