Santa's Bag of Goodies

Back around Christmas I was thinking about Christmas stockings. I love being the Santa responsible for the stockings, for finding unique little goodies to tuck into this old holiday tradition.

Tyler or Jaci asked me something about stocking contents the day before Christmas. I don't remember what they were wanting to add to the mix—did I have a couple of quarters or did I have a …? (Truthfully, a lot of water and ice has gone under the bridge in the over-two months that has passed since Christmas. Holy HandHolding! A lot! I'm not surprised I can't remember the details of conversations that took place on December 24th!)

The conversation made me remember Christmases when the boys were little. I would find—with great care and lots of thought—appropriate things to put in their stockings. There would be little games and puzzles, Matchbox cars, whistles or toy harmonicas, yo-yos and jacks, new boxes of Crayola Crayons. You get the idea? Sweet little thoughtful gadgets and knick-knacks that would please sweet little boys.

And then, at the last possible moment, ten minutes before we retired on Christmas Eve, knowing the boys would be up at the crack of reindeer hooves in the morning, the Father of My Children would start scouring the house for things to stuff into the perfectly packed stockings. He'd roam through the kitchen, grabbing oranges and apples and nuts off the counter. Produce! Produce that I had carefully chosen in the grocery store for our meals and snacks! Not for stocking stuffers! Nowhere in the Encyclopedia of Christmas does it say that adults in the 20th Century choose apples and oranges and walnuts for stocking stuffers. It's antisocial! It's unAmerican!

And isn't it amusing that, at Christmas of 2009, when my sweet little boys are 36 and 35 and I'm choosing stocking stuffers for my grandchildren, I still remember my disgust that FOMC would do something so thoughtless as simply grabbing an orange off the counter to stuff into a stocking.

The fact that I still remember it must mean he stuffed an orange in my stocking, too. I hate oranges. Get sick when I smell a freshly peeled orange. Especially when someone has dug their fingernails into it to peel it. Yuck. Gross. Shudder. Oh yeah, I developed that distaste for oranges when I was eight months pregnant with my younger son and I had to mow the lawn because my husband wouldn't do it. I was too pregnant to bend over and pick up the rotten oranges in our Florida yard, so I just had to mow over them, splattering rotten orange juice all over my legs. Yuck. Gross. Shudder.

Any questions?

Don't put an orange in my Christmas stocking!