The Joy of Giving Is What Christmas Is All About

I heard the pounding of heavy footsteps on my porch as I prepared my breakfast of oatmeal and a banana. When I went outside, I discovered a package from my best friend, Lauren Miller, sitting on my porch. I did manage to eat my breakfast before I tore into the box.

Lauren knows me very well. She gave me three WebKinz, the Brown Cow, the Cardinal, and the Gray Squirrel. The Cow and the Squirrel were so popular, Ganz retired them before they were even released! I had a stuffed brown cow named Clarabelle in high school. I once brought her to school as part of a Halloween costume. The girls on the field hockey team all decided to dress as farmers my senior year. I didn't have a pair of regular overalls...but I did have overalls with a "skort," a skirt over shorts, so I wore those, a bandanna around my hair, gave myself "freckles" with makeup, carried Clarabelle, and called myself the Farmer's Wife. Clarabelle was a big hit - one girlfriend dressed as a cowgirl wouldn't let her go when I let her hold her!

I also received the new Get Smart movie (the reviews weren't great, but it sounds like fun and I like Steve Carrell), two WebKinz Ornaments (how many people can claim to have Zangoz and Googles on their tree?), and $25 gift cards for FYE, Barnes and Noble, and the Vermont Country Store. Lauren sent me two catalogs for the last-named, and I'll probably check out their website sometime after Christmas as well.

The weather was gloomy, cold, and damp, but neither raining nor sleeting nor snowing, or even blowing. I was able to get over to the Haddon Township Library for this week's library volunteering session. I returned children's books, which were literally overflowing on the returns cart. I don't put books away more often because I have a habit of reading them before I can put them back...especially the children's books! I did manage to get some put away before I headed back out. The Library ended up giving me a Christmas present of sorts when I found a Disney Comic Book on the sale table. It was originally 50 cents, but after I explained I was out of change and would have to give them a larger bill, they just gave it to me for free!

(I'm glad I did get to the library today. It's highly unlikely I'll have the time next week. Christmas Eve is a week from today.)

I spent the rest of the afternoon after coming home working on my holiday baking and watching Christmas movies, specials, and TV show episodes. The Biscotti came out fine. I broke the last few candy canes on the last batch, but I'll just give those to Mom and Dad. Daddy and Keefe won't notice if any are broken. They'll eat anything that's edible. I had more trouble with the Stollen. I made it all right, but I accidentally set it on the wrong temperature, and it took forever to bake. Then the glaze didn't come out right at all. I always make it too runny. I'm still going to give it to Rose and Craig, but I hope they don't mind that it's a little too crispy on the outside and very sticky.

Perfect Strangers did two Christmas episodes, the second season's A Christmas Story and the fourth season's Gift of the Mypiot. I prefer the first one. Larry's very much looking forward to taking Balki home to his family for Christmas, but a blizzard leaves them stranded in Chicago. Larry's bitterly disappointed, until Balki finds a way to remind Larry that at Christmas, our families are wherever we are...and we don't need Christmas turtles and roasted radishes to make happy holiday memories.

Gift of the Mypiot is quite different. The boys were working at the Chicago Chronicle by this point. Larry has forbidden Balki from inviting their nasty boss Mr. Gorpley to their big Christmas Eve party, but kind-hearted Balki does anyway. Gorpley proceeds to annoy everyone around him at the party...until Balki discovers the real reason he's behaving so badly. How Balki finally shows Mr. Gorpley the Christmas spirit is one of the loveliest moments in the entire series.

I did Remember WENN's Christmas In the Airwaves next. The WENN staff are set for a good old-fashioned happy holiday, until the station's grieving owner and her snobby financier arrive and order no Christmas at the station! It takes a holiday team effort to show their boss that life goes on, and that we'll always keep our loved ones in our hearts, especially during the holidays.

I only had very vague memories of The Man In the Santa Claus Suit, a 1979 TV movie. Fred Astaire appears in a variety of roles has he helps three men - a down-and-out homeless man, a too-busy political aide, and a nervous math teacher hoping to ask his glamorous girlfriend to marry him - solve their problems on Christmas Eve. I like the homeless man's sweet, somewhat Home Alone-esque story the best. The aide's story came off as a bit melodramatic and seemed rushed, while the math teacher's story was adorable, but also a bit more predictable.

Mickey's Once Upon a Christmas came out in 1999 as an anthology of three Disney shorts featuring the regular characters, two of them adapted from famous holiday short stories. My favorite by far is "Donald Duck: Stuck On Christmas", Disney's adaptation of Christmas Every Day. It was really more like Groundhog Day - Huey, Dewey, and Louie wish it could be Christmas every day, with some fairly hilarious results. The other short story adaptation was also lovely, Mickey and Minnie's version of Gift of the Magi, but the Max and Goofy story about Santa feels a bit uneven.

Oh, and meet Arizona the Cardinal, Clarabelle the Brown Cow, and Rocky the Squirrel! Clarabelle and Arizona are going to live in the new Christmas room. They just put out the rest of the Christmas theme this evening, and while I agree it's a little busy, some of it is really pretty. I especially love the little retro lamp with all the greens around it. They also got the tree that you get from the codes that come with the ornaments. I don't know where I'm going to put Rocky yet. I'll adopt him last.