Holiday Memories

It’s snowy and cold here and as much as I hate cold, I love this time of year.  Today I’m writing Christmas cards and going back in time.  Thumbing through my address book brings back memories.  The names of relatives I’ve not connected with recently and the same with some friends pop up and the little details about them rush forward. 

Some are the fun things we did or shared.  Other memories, the not so fun that they were there to support me through or I’ve tried to be there for them on.  

Seeing the names of cousins that tolerated me as a child (they were a lot older) transports me back in time to my aunt’s kitchen.  The ‘little me’ waiting in anticipation to scrap the cake batter from the bowl she used to mix up the ingredients of her family famous chocolate and coconut cakes.  Relatives who hadn’t showed their face all year would manage to drop in around the holidays for a slice of one of them.  The image of her apron, fresh when she put it on, now smeared with flour from her wiping her hands, her steel rimmed glasses sliding down her nose, and her fine hair of the same color, pulled back in a tight little bun, dances through my mind.  But the strongest memory is the love I feel each time she peers at me over the glasses as she tells me stories of her childhood. 

I think these memories are what started my annual cookie back when my own daughter was small.  It became a tradition that she demanded we keep, even after she married and had her own home.  She’d drive the hour plus on the date we set to bake and talk, then reverse the trip with bags of the goodies we created that day.  Today, she continues the tradition with her own daughters, who wouldn’t let us think of skipping the event because schedules are insane. 

And that’s what is happening this coming Saturday…baking time at my daughter’s house.  I’ll arrive early with my assigned items to bring, with luck DIL and her daughter will make it too and the kitchen will be filled with females of various ages laughing, talking and sampling.  Exhausted at the end of the day we will all be, but we’ll have the memories to tie us over until next year and our friends will have the fruits of our labor to enjoy. 

So what memories do you have from your holidays?  Do you have traditions that you carry on or use this time of year to pull out memories, or like me, some of both.  We would love to hear about them!!