Music and Cats

My sister Melanie called this afternoon to talk about plans for Christmas, which Paul and I will spend in Houston with my side of our family.

As is often the case, our conversation was a bit disjointed. Little boys want their mother’s attention when they want it, not when she is finished talking with their Aunt Kimberly. Truth be told, I enjoy listening to Melanie’s often humorous interactions with her boys. On this particular day, Melanie spent much of our call with a naked 3-year-old boy in her lap. Shortly after he flopped his bare little body face-down across her legs, I heard a quiet patting sound. “This is the sound of a naked rump,” my sister said. Pat pat pat pat pat. “That’s not a rump,” I heard Reed say, “That’s my bottom.” I laughed; Melanie continued patting.

The talk turned from bottoms to Christmas presents. In years past, much of the time that Paul and I spent in Houston before Christmas was given over to shopping. While I love giving (and receiving) gifts, buying Christmas presents for my family has become an increasingly complicated proposition. We are a rather particular (some might even say picky) bunch. Furthermore, we are blessed to have all of the belongings that we really need. In fact, we have more things than we need or want. My parents, Melanie’s family, and Paul and I have all been trying to purge our lives and homes of extraneous stuff.

Last December, Melanie and I decided to opt out of shopping, and give Christmas presents that we’d made. Paul and I gave my homemade jams, pickles and chutneys. Melanie made calendars from her beautiful photos of the boys. I had thought I might miss the excitement of shopping, but I didn’t. Today, Melanie asked if I want to give homemade presents again this year. Oh, yes! (Like last year, we are making an exception for books. We love books. There will be books.)

What will we do instead of shopping? We’ll go to one (or more) of Houston’s farmers markets. We may take the boys to visit a local farm that has a CSA program. I’ll buy meyer lemons and ruby red grapefruit (local in Texas!) to make marmalade. We’ll play games, sing carols, dance to silly songs. We’ll bake and decorate cookies. We’ll read Christmas stories aloud. We’ll enjoy spending time together. And that is just about the best Christmas gift I can imagine.

A couple of years ago, Janeen and her son folded colorful origami stars to decorate their Christmas tree. Inspired, I bought a page-a-day origami calendar; I’ve had that sheaf of calendar pages on top of my CPU ever since. Today, as I thought about a homemade Christmas, I had an urge to fold stars. Day 2 of my Holidailies online advent calendar is the 8-pointed origami star that I folded today.

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