White Trash Christmas - Celebration with no money
Oh we had a lovely Christmas.
It started off with what is being turned into a new family tradition.
A few years ago I read an article in the newspaper about a woman who didn’t have enough money to buy her son the 62 cent can of pears that he wanted for Christmas. She was asking for financial assistance from the community so that he son could have a “nice Christmas”.
This spurred some discussion in our house about financial planning, priorities, self-sacrifice, and creativity (or lack there-of). I realize people have financial difficulties during the holidays (hey we’ve been there ourselves) but I couldn’t understand the lack of planning or initiative that would leave a child dependent on a can of pears in order to have a “nice Christmas”.
I told my kids that Christmas was not dependent on money but on the spirit and sense of togetherness that it evoked. I declared to my 6 children that we were going to have a “White Trash Christmas” (trash as in recycled) where I was going to provide them with a really memorable celebration that would not cost a dime.
I started collecting things that came to me free, two boxes of cereal samples, broken candy canes, a bag of chocolate chips, mints from a restaurant, bit of paper, decorations, and cards and put them all into a bag.
A few days before our celebration, I pulled them all out and started creating gifts and activities.
After dinner, the night before the Night before Christmas, I called all the kids into the TV room and we started our celebration. Oh sure there were a few derisive laughs from some of the older teenaged kids who were sure that my trash Christmas was going to be just another one of mom’s “crazy ideas”.
I painted 3 white votive candles left over from Halloween pumpkins. Using red acrylic paint (from our craft box) I put a large J on one, an O on another, and then a Y on the last. We started off the evening by dimming the lights and lighting the JOY candles. I don’t care what you are celebrating, candles and lights make it that much more magical.
We then had cereal bites made with the sample cereals and some melted white and dark chocolate. “These are really good” said at least 3 of the kids.
Then we played a game called “Favorite memory” where each person drew a card that asked them to tell about their favorite school memory, or winter, or pool, or summer memories. I made the Favorite Memory game from index cards, markers and a bowl. All I did was create 18 cards that had various memory categories “Favorite XXX memory”, put them all into a bowl and then each person drew a card. The Christmas bell was a small nice sounding bell with a leather strap that I had already had.
Each person was able to play twice and we all listened as each person recounted a fun or memorable event from the past. As a parent it was fascinating to hear what the kids cherished as some of their favorite times. Every time you completed your turn you rang the Christmas bell and “earned” a small mint (thanks to a local restaurant).
Once we had played the game, I handed out small gifts to each of the kids; each child received a bookmark, and a small decoration or handout that I had received at some point in the previous month. Again there was a little bit of mocking as the older kids exaggeratedly oohed and ahhed over the free bookmarks.
But then I handed each child a hand decorated, personalized card that told them what I valued in them, how much I enjoyed them, what I saw as their strengths and how I was proud and filled with honor in seeing them develop into young, independent, intelligent people.
The older kids, who had been the quickest to mock this event, were the first ones to have tears in their eyes. The room became very quiet as each person read their cards exclaiming “oh I got a good one”, “So did I”, “I did too”.
All of the kids spontaneously fell into a group hug with Marc and me and they then placed their cards in places of honor on the Christmas tree.
We ended the evening watching an old VHS version of “It’s a Wonderful Life” and munching little broken bits of candy canes that I had dipped into chocolate.
Our White Trash Christmas celebration far exceeded my expectations and in fact, the kids (even the teenagers) requested that this become something we do every year.
I’m not sure that I proved anything other than where there’s a will there’s a way, but I did create a very fine remembrance that the kids will tuck away when they pull out memories of their fondest Christmas celebrations.