Christmas at home

There are things I remember about Christmas as a kid: Bing Crosby singing about his dreams of a White Christmas, my mom's pride about her Jell-O salad, playing games and playing with our new toys, a fire blazing in the fireplace, frost outside in the morning, and my mom busy in the kitchen churning out yummy things for us to eat.

We spent Christmas in Moraga this year and it was fantastic. And it was just as it has always been. This year it was just the three of us, my mom and brother.

Yes, my mom made a wonderful Jell-O salad, Rocky and I played at least 10 games of Scrabble and Rocky and Kevin played Go, Lucas played busily with all his new toys, we saw the frost outside on the lawn and on the rooftops, and we all ate more than our share of good food and sweets. We even threw our environmental standards out the door and Kevin rustled up a great fire in my mom's fireplace.

Lucas was so excited about all his gifts, especially all his toys. And he remembered what he wrote on his list to Santa and mentally checked off that Santa gave him everything he asked for (and much much more). At night and during self-imposed breaks during the day, he took some time off from his toys and picked up his books for a change of pace.

It was a really nice Christmas. More than anything, it really reinforced the great memories of what Christmas is like at my mom's house.