This year I am sharing three new stitched ornaments for our tree. I made them all earlier this year.
Jo would like us to also share our best Christmas present ever. I would have to say I received that back in 1987. Brian and I had been dating for 13 months. I was 18, he was 19 years old. I was invited to spend Christmas eve with his family. Well you can imagine I was a bit nervous.
I should give you a bit of background history here briefly. Brian's father created his own business when Brian was young. He ended up doing very well for himself financially. I came from a poor family. My father and mother divorced when I was 8. We rarely saw my father. He never paid child support. My mother constantly struggled to get food for our table. I have three younger brothers. So we were all used to having not much and accepted this.
So on with the story! It came time for me to open my one gift. It was a very large box. I opened it to find a new, white, down-filled winter coat and royal blue knitted hat, mittens and scarf. My MIL had noticed my thin winter coat that truly did NOT keep me warm here in Wisconsin. Now I had NEVER in my life received such gifts at Christmas. To say I was overwhelmed with emotion, well that is putting it mildly. So what did I do? I could not even look up, because I was crying. Not just one teardrop mind you, I was an emotional mess. Brian was stunned. His only sibling, my future BIL Andy, was staring. My future MIL was trying to figure out what was wrong. My future FIL, he saved me. He knew instantly. He grew up poor also. He knew what it was like to receive a fantastic gift and be ever so grateful for it. He jumped up and "got busy distracting everyone" after he handed me a tissue box. They all gave me a moment or two to collect myself and my voice. And then I thanked them properly, and the rest is history.
Stitching and praying,
Vickie
