The blog hasn't seen much love for about a year now. I briefly interviewed our parents in December 2020 on their favorite Christmas memory over all the years. I meant to write this back in December but time got away from me. Below is an attempt to relate those memories here for the group.
The first memory that came to mind for both parents was their first Christmas in California where they actually stayed. I'm not talking December 1980 when Tina is born on December 24th, to forever lose her birthday to Santa Claus. Mom spoke briefly about 1980 Christmas and how they drove home the day after Christmas and she is still bleeding from the birth and they were crazy to drive 12 hours with a 2 day old baby. I told them at least they didn't have to buckle anyone in the car, we could just roam about without a safety care in the world. No one could confirm if Tina had a car seat, they were pretty sure but hey its the 80s.
The Christmas that stuck out to mom was 1981 Christmas in Santa Monica. Anyone who has lived in California with 3 young children understands real poverty because the cost of living is high and diapers aren't cheap. They didn't have a lot of money and mom who didn't want to move out here was sad to miss Christmas in Utah. She said one day Dad came home with Christmas lights, the giant multicolored ones. (The large kind like the picture above, they were kept over the years and featured on 2282 back in the day.) She wasn't even sure how he had the money to buy them but dad said he just worked it out. He wasn't about to give up on the California dream, ok, I took liberties with that line, he didn't say that line. Dad actually said that he couldn't have his wife sad so he said, I'm buying lights and he just spent the money. So they had their first real California Christmas.
The second Christmas memory that both of them remembered was December 1985 and had to do with the Wooden Manger in the garage for so many years. I'm not sure its there anymore but I tried to put a picture above to help you remember. Ours was definitely a darker color brown and very dusty. I always wondered why they had this manager? Were these people just putting on so many living nativities over the years they just had the costumes and props ready at a moments notice? Turns out the manager was the start of Christmas tree inspecting for Californian Ericksons.
They would go to houses in the ward with the manger and put it on the front step and knock the door. At this point there was a disagreement among Mom and Dad and that was weather we put Luke in the manager or not? Mom said that they would leave it empty and they would ask Where is the Christ Child? and then they would ask to come in to find the Spirit of Christ in the home.
So this was before Luke, so now we are talking 1984 maybe, no one was solid on dates. We can attribute that to age or car accidents but I think its because our parents were raising kids in the 1980s and they can't remember a single thing that happened in that decade. When you are in the trenches people its hard to keep up with what's going on in the world. I mean they barely knew who Hall and Oates were and didn't discover them until Troubies in 1999. Thank you Romeo Hall and Juliet Oats!
Dad had a memory of putting Luke in the manager and singing Silent Night on the front porch. This is definitely the account of a secondary witness because I don't have notes so I have no idea what they would actually sing. I'm pretty sure he said Silent Night but its been 2 months from the interview and I have 4 children so my mind is shot. I am probably missing out on some great singing duo form this decade, just like our parents, I have no idea.
The last Christmas that they agreed was a fun time was 1995 because everyone was home for Christmas. They said it was fun to see everyone line up shortest to tallest, with Kaleb in Front, and we marched into the family room to open our presents together. I guess after that year there was always one person or another missing for Missions, Military, and family life. So anyways, thank you for reading my sketchy account of our parents favorite Christmas Memories. I hope everyone is living the dream out there!
Love,
Luke
P.S.
I spoke to the parents yesterday 2/6/2021 on this topic again just to see how wrong I got it and apparently I got it pretty wrong. So I guess historians are correct to not trust secondary witnesses, what do we know but lies. Corrections are as follows,
1) Dad was the one who said we would put no baby in manager and Mom was the one saying we would put Luke in the manager and its still very much debated. They also confirmed that this was not the origin of Christmas tree inspection but was a variation added to the Christmas tree inspection events. Dad said they would put the empty manger on the door step and then knock on the door and wait. When the family would come out they would ask where is the Christ Child and then ask to see if we could find it in their home?
2) Mom said 1981 Christmas where dad bought outside Christmas lights he also bought an indoor Christmas Tree. She said she could remember it clearly because the Tree cost $49 and she honestly didn't know how they were going to afford that.
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