Childhood Memories & New Traditions. . .

Christmas traditions are mostly made up of the little things . . . vague memories that only emerge with the decades-old ornaments and tangled strings of lights. The best memories go back to our childhood. The memories aren't necessarily the Currier & Ive's moments that make for inviting prose. . . just sentimental reminiscing that warms our hearts. . . Like the smell of oranges and the taste of peanuts from that little brown-bag we all received as a child after the church Christmas pageant. Remember that? OH! How I enjoyed those peanuts - and sucking on the shells!

I remember the dozens of red apple-ornaments my mother decorated our tree with . . . and three small circa-1963 plastic reindeer with gold glitter . . . Which glitter -- by the time I was ten- or eleven-years-old -- had been completely rubbed off by little hands playing-out the "Rudolph" story. My mom still puts out these dear old reindeer every year.

My favorite Christmastime memory -- as shallow as this sounds -- was the total silence on Christmas Eve in my Grandpa & Grandma Wehlan's house in Blue Island, Illinois. After all the presents had been opened and Grandma finally turned off Moody Radio, I'd climb into bed with her and fall asleep in complete stillness. To this day, I cannot think of a time or place I've felt more secure and happy.

Fast forward several decades: Here's a few of the "little things" that make Christmas magic at the Goossen Home:

For each year of our marriage, my husband and I either make or purchase a new ornament that somehow reflects or symbolizes the past year for us. Sometimes it’s serious, like an open Bible representing Mark's call to a new church and the opportunity to share God’s Word -- Or a small carpenter’s tool-box to remind us of the year the church re-built after an arson fire. Sometimes it’s silly, like a fish to remind us of all the fish we (wished we’d) caught on our family fishing outings. Each year when we decorate the tree, we have a wonderful time of remembering the precious moments from our past together.

As a ministry family, we have taught our children the Scriptural principle of Acts 20:35. . .

“. . . remembering the words of the Lord Jesus himself said: ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’”

. . . Each year we do something special and unique for the shut-ins in our church and community. Last year, we became skilled weavers after making 74 homemade potholders! We delivered them with fresh homemade gingerbread boys complete with blue-icing mittens and "red-hot's" candy buttons.

And . . . this one’s especially contemporary since I grew up in Indiana where we rarely had a white Christmas. Ya' need SNOW for Snow Ice Cream:

Ingredients:
4 cups freshly fallen clean snow
½ cup milk
2 Tbsp sugar
1 tsp. vanilla

Instructions:
Mix milk, sugar and vanilla together as children collect the snow. Blend milk mixture with the snow and eat immediately with chocolate chips! We live in MINNESOTA now. . . Snow? Yea, we got that!

Sometimes as adults, Christmas loses the magic it once found in our hearts as children. Being the adult now charged with full control of the decorating and the shopping and the planning and the baking and the card sending and et.al. . . . sort of shrinks the magic and depletes the fun.

We have a tendency to get all philosophical about things and in a sense we figure we can overlook the joy that we should be experiencing and say we celebrate Christmas everyday, because we are continually grateful for JESUS CHRIST who came to deliver us from sorrow and sin and death. On that First Original Christmas Morning, Eternal LIFE was born in a stable! (And - DUH!) Of course. . .

BUT. . . As parent, it is our awesome responsibility to inaugurate the magic of traditions in our young families. For me -- having married late in life -- I’m just getting into the swing of this traditions-making-thing, and only in the last few years have we established some special Goossen Christmas traditions. To watch my own children admire and experience the "magic" brings it back to my own heart. . . .

After all . . . the best memories go back to our childhood. . . . [Excuse me.]

Kid: "Mom! I thought you were going to vacuum the carpet in my room!!"

Me: "Do I look like the housekeeper?
Kid: "You're wearing the apron."
{pause}

I gotta' go!

~ Esthermay Bentley-Goossen
© 2008 The Heart of a Pastor's Wife

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