Christmas Memories

I'm not really one of those people who can say that I remember distinct scenes in all their details. My memory files itself in piles--these are all my Christmas memories, all my birthday memories, all my school memories, whatever. But I'll try to say something about Christmases I've had. (all these pics are from this Christmas, though!)

 When I was five or six, we were living in Okinawa, Japan, and I'd just learned to make origami cranes and I was making them all the time. We needed something new to add to the tree, so mom and I made dozens of cranes out of the shiny wrapping paper we'd been wrapping all the presents in, and nestled them in the branches. We saved all of them, and they went up again for years afterward, even when we were no longer in Japan.

 When we were in Scotland, one of the years I had the worst flu I'd ever had. I was too sick to go to bed, so I slept on the couch for about a week, including Christmas Eve, and that night I must've had a fever-hallucination or a really weird dream or something, because I know mom turned off the tree when she went to bed, but I 'woke up' when someone I couldn't see in the upper corner of the room told me I had to look at the tree, and when I did, all the lights were bright-blue-white like stars. Then the cat jumped up into my face and said "Are you alright??". I don't remember what happened after that, but I do remember that I felt like crap Christmas morning!

 One year, also in Scotland, I got a Sylvanian Families house and my brother got a huge Lego castle, and we all sat on the floor for hours surrounded by tiny parts, alternating which building we were playing with. I kept stepping on Legos, and my sister kept trying to put her Sylvanians in my house.

A few years ago, the year H was in China (and this might be on this Blog somewhere, I don't remember), I spent the entirety of Christmas Eve watching X-Files, then Doctor Who, and loom-knitting myself a Fourth Doctor scarf. It took 15 hours, but I'd worked for nine days in a row beforehand and I didn't want to do anything else, and having a whole day to myself, where I could just sit and watch the shows I loved best and not have to talk to anyone but the cats was something wonderful. I still have the scarf, but its in storage, and I woke up this morning feeling sad that I couldn't wear it when I was sitting around the house alone again today, while everyone else worked too many hours too early!

What are some of your weird Christmas memories?

Happy Christmas, everyone!