You told me that you wanted to be a pirate for Christmas this year. I had to tell you that it wasn't that kind of holiday.
We had Christmas at Grandma and Grandpa Lam's big house in Madison. Uncle Alex and Aunt Lena were with us this year, which was nice. Uncle Alex played Legos with you for a long time one day, and Aunt Lena gave you an amazing hand-drawn coloring book. She even made mazes for you. It's very cool. Your favorite present, though, was a little light-up airplane. You liked it so much you took it to bed with you for the rest of the week.
We had a really good month before Christmas as well. You and Dad spent some time in the garage making higher supports for your wooden train tracks, so that you could build, "elevator trains." We went to the Children's Museum with the Stauffers, and you had so much fun playing with Adrian that you invited him over the next weekend, too. It was really fun to watch you two play. You don't have the attention span yet to really sit down and do an activity together, like build a train track or play a game, so the house was eventually covered ankle-deep in all kinds of toys. Hopefully this summer we'll be able to get together with them and go up to the playground at the park. Dad and I came to observe in your classroom, and you spent the whole time drawing pictures of volcanoes and showing them to us. It made me laugh because you do the same thing at home all the time. Why do we send you to preschool again?
We got our first big snowfall of the winter, about 10" as measured by me standing inside and looking at our picnic table. You had fun helping Dad shovel a couple of times. Then you tried to build a snowman, but the snowballs got too big, so you built a snow horse instead. It was pretty cool. Aunt Cele came over to help Grandma for a couple of days while Grandpa went to Arizona to visit with Aunt Irene and Cousin Sharon. She brought all kinds of crafty projects that she and Aunt Alice put together for you to do.
We went to a pancake breakfast at church and you got to watch a magic show and then get a present from Saint Nick. You thought the magic show was pretty great, especially since you got to help out with one of the tricks. It was a pretty good show, and you even got to pet the bunny afterward. When Saint Nick came out to hand out presents, you were excited of course. There were about 30 children waiting, and you were the very last child to get his present. Grandma and I were getting more and more anxious that there wouldn't be a present for you, that you would have been forgotten somehow, so when Saint Nick called your name, both of us were very relieved.
While we were in Madison, Grandma kept saying things like, "This might be our last Christmas at this house." She made Uncle Alex and I go through things that we'd saved from our teenage years, which was kind of fun. I found a stash of old photographs which will embarrass all of my high school friends. You and I took two boxes of books to Half Price Books and come home with a new picture book and a new Madeline movie. It's good to get rid of things that we don't need--our ultimate satisfaction in life should not rest on the things that we own. There will always be special things that we want to keep, that hold memories and feelings, but the majority of our possessions are really only here for our convenience. And in many cases, they would be more useful to someone else instead of hanging around our house. It's especially good to remember that at Christmas, which has become in many ways about stuff instead of people. We all love to give and receive gifts, but we have to remember the most important part about Christmas: spending time with loved ones and beating them at Scrabble.
Love,
Mom
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