A Couple of Memorable Gifts

I have a couple of memorable gifts. The first is a Christmas quilt made by hand by my Grandma before I was born.

Seen here being commandeered by the cat.

She's made one for all of my siblings too, as well as matching stockings.

It's a family tradition that we put our quilts on our beds for the month of December and curl up with them for Christmas morning, so I have many memories of opening stockings with it draped around my shoulders or, as I grew older, smirking with my sisters while my Dad opened presents from "Santa" that were the very specific things only he would've known to buy himself, hmmmm....

The second one is much more recent, but needs two points of context. For my time as an adult I've been used to a) not having any hope of financial assistance from my family, though maybe a food care package from my sisters if things got really dire, and b) until about a year ago, having my significant other's family intensely dislike me.

A couple of months ago I had to do some sudden repairs on my car and my savings got tied up and unavailable, until at one point I had $3 in my account. Luckily I had some bonds I could cash in, and I used some of the money to go visit my boyfriend as a way to help me de-stress.

While I was there, his mom approached me and let me know she wanted to help; completely unused to this sort of thing, I half-heartedly objected several times before gratefully accepting, then stared at the folded check on the desk like it was an alien. I decided that, hey, at least that would cover my gas there and back... and then opened it up and almost fell out of my chair. It wasn't the money itself that was memorable, but instead the relief it gave me from stressing out about bills, and the feeling of (please read this in the voice of a beauty pageant queen) "you like me, you really like me!"


(As an aside that I just think is amusing, when I wandered up to my boyfriend wide-eyed and told him about it, he immediately apologized that I might've felt embarrassed; when I got home and told my sister about it she was surprised and made as big of a deal out of it as I had. Different upbringings, I guess...)

Christmas Endings and Beginnings

It really doesn't feel like Christmas now. There's no tree up this year, and the weather is surprisingly warm, so all of the usual signals that it's Christmas are absent. I'm just about done with my gift making/wrapping and have tried putting on Christmas music to get myself in the mood but it feels a little forced.

I'm hoping that getting down to the new place - which is decorated and Christmas-y - will help get me into the spirit, as will having a lot of time with family over Christmas and the following week; I get to go visit my boyfriend's family, my sister and new nephew, and finally come back to the city for New Year's Eve.

While I wouldn't necessarily wish it on anyone, it's kind of nice that my family's all broke because there isn't a large expectation for presents. I think the consumeristic Christmas bubble broke last year, when I spent the holidays stressing out because I couldn't afford both to buy all the things asked of me and afford food, and one elder sister was having trouble coming up with money for bills but didn't tell anyone.

The only thing I'm nervous about is one particular present this year. I've felt really hurt by one of my siblings who has inexplicably given me a hard time for making presents and expressed the expectation that one day I'll grow up and buy more things (this is inexplicable because she also makes some presents, isn't exchanging gifts with me this year, and just listened to me have a conversation about what to buy with my present partner).

I'm sending her a package filled with handmade gifts (well, except for the customary lotion-as-stocking-stuffer).

I'm not being passive-aggressive, I promise! I made sure they were all things that suit her tastes and needs, and I'm hoping to make the whole thing into a joke to ease some of the tension. But I realize that it's a tricky line to walk and that this could all blow up in my face, so I'm still trying to figure out whether to call or leave a letter in the package, bring the gift with me when I visit or send it in the mail, etc. It's tricky.

Wish me luck, nerdfighters, and DFTBA over the holidays! I'll see you guys just before the end of 2011.