Monday, December 17, 2012

Holidays Past: The Official Start of Christmas (Guest Post)

Hello Everyday Adventurers! I am Jess and I normally blog over at Express the Jess, but I am so happy to be sharing Christmas memories here today.

In general, my parents did a good job of not spoiling my brother and me. The only time they set aside this rule was Christmas. They always went all out with decorations, food, and especially gifts. Thus, as kids (and bigger kids), my brother and I anxiously awaited Christmas morning.

Circa 1989 

Every year, my brother and I pushed to have Christmas morning start earlier and earlier. It got to the point that my parents had to put an official start time for our Christmas celebrations to begin. My brother and I would wake up early in the morning, usually two or three, and watch tv, play games, and countdown to our official start of Christmas. As soon as the clock struck five o'clock, we would barrel up the stairs to my parent’s bedroom to wake them up.

Circa 1992

Once we were all awake, we headed to the living room together. We started with our stockings, opening each tiny wrapped package.

Left-Circa 1995/Right-Circa 1998

After stockings, we moved on to the regular Christmas gifts. First, we would sort all of the gifts under the tree. We would then take turns opening our gifts one by one, always in a predetermined order set by my mother. It was always a long process and even though we started when the sky was pitch black, the sun would be up and out by the time we finished.

Circa 2000

Our Christmas mornings started so early, I usually ended up needing a nap before lunch.

Circa 2002

Did anyone else have an official start time for Christmas morning? Happy Holidays everyone!

6 comments

  1. When we were little we would start Christmas at 5 am too! Now I enjoy sleeping in :)

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  2. We were never allowed to start until 6, haha. It's kind of become tradition, though, so now that we're all 21+, we still get up by 7 :)

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  3. Glad we're not the only ones who got up early :)
    Thanks for having me Allie!

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    1. Thank YOU for your post! We never had a set time to wake up, and as an adult sans kids, I'm more than happy to sleep in til 7 or 8 on Christmas morning!

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  4. Oh, man, I always hated that my brothers wanted to get up so early. It was 6am for us, and even though we're adults now, they still insist on waking up that early. I will never understand it. The presents will still be there!

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  5. We were forced to wait until 6am as well! My sister and I would set our alarm to ensure that we didn't miss a single second of the holidays.

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