Christmas Glitches

I've been thinking about Christmases past recently, due to the forbearing holiday season which is fast approaching. There are a lot of memories for me surrounding the Christmas period, including many bouts of poor health in recent years (ranging from bronchitis to stomach tissue damage to the good old seasonal flu), but the first one I'd like to hone in on is when I was around 7-years-old and my sister around 9.

1. The time my parents got it wrong

Everyone has relatives who they feel obligated to buy for, just like everyone has the distant 'aunts' and 'uncles' who aren't actually related but always send a £10 voucher for something or other. In the same way, everyone- everyone- has those family members who always buy them clothes. For my family, this is my mum's youngest brother... well, his wife. My auntie, uncle and cousins can always be counted on to send us each a fashionable clothing item; whether a pinstriped shirt for my dad or pajamas for my brothers or matching dresses for me and my sister, there are always clothes for us on Christmas day from those family members. One year I remember very specifically opening some lovely pajamas from my auntie- similar to my sister's but mine were mint green and hers were baby pink. I said "Oh! Pajamas!" to which my parents replied in unison "They're quite clearly day clothes." My sister agreed and no matter how much I protested, I was backed into a corner by three adamant advocates for my auntie's choice of day clothes for our Christmas presents. There were slouchy hip-sitting trousers with pink or green, brown and yellow vertical stripes with pink and green vest-tops with embroidered cats on. I remember thinking they were the flimsiest, least secure clothes I would ever wear and was sure my auntie had picked these by mistake. Then when my parents insisted we wear them for our auntie, uncle and cousin's visit just before New Year, I was powerless to resist and begrudgingly changed from my nightie to these thin, un-winterly clothes. My auntie arrived to find me and my sister stood on a chair in the living room trying to open the french doors and exclaimed "Oh! You're still in your pajamas?" I was mortified that we were wearing matching pajamas as day clothes, fuming angry with my parents for insisting they were day clothes, yet still relatively smug that I had been right all along. I still bring it up sometimes, simply to see the look of horror-struck remembrance at the embarrassing time my parents made me and my sister wear pajamas in the day time.

2. The time my grandma got it wrong

The second Christmas memory I would like to shine a light on took place a few years later, when I thought me and my sister were old enough to stand up to our grandma when she brought us clothes and shoes to be rivaled with. Every time my grandma visits, she'll bring us (my sister and I) something she thought was most flattering in 1955. When she was younger my grandma had a real eye for fashion, due to working a fair time of her adult life as a sales assistant for Next. As a result she would be blessed with end-of-line stock as and when she pleased- which was often, the scrimper my grandma was (and still is). Don't get me wrong, I'm not stupid, I know fashion is on a cycle and we're currently back to the 50's-60's with bright blocks and skater skirts and leather jackets and ankle boots. However styles are very different to specific items of clothing and when my grandma presents you with a three tiered white dress which has been sat in her wardrobe for 40 years, you'll be running for the hills faster than a relay with Mo Farah and Usain Bolt. Firstly, I was about 11 and still skinny as a rake, my ever flattering grandma- a solid size 18- hands me a size 16 dress and says "I should imagine this will still fit you if you want it". To add insult to injury the dress was a horrible should-be-white-but-washed-down-to-ecru colour. After a good 10 minutes of me ensuring her I don't suit white, she tried to force the dress on my sister, who tried to accept on my behalf out of spite, but my mum came to the rescue, insisting herself that white did not suit either of her girls as we 'couldn't keep a black top clean'. Thanks mum. This year though, my grandma had brought a bag of old shoes which had been quite the pieces in her day. Unfortunately, they weren't anymore. In spite of us telling her over and over that they would simply be thrown out, we found them after dropping her home on boxing day, mismatched and odd pairs alike, in a huge brown bag. And lo- at the bottom of the bag what do you expect we find? The dress.

3. The time Santa got it wrong

The last is about my parent's undoing at their own hands. Unfortunately, the more children you have, the more complicated the process of Christmas gifts is, especially when Santa has 3bn other children to think about, am I right? So Santa used to do an extraordinary thing- write our first initials on our presents. "Ah, how clever." you may be thinking- not clever enough though when you try to get too organised- matching wrapping paper. There must have been a glitch in the matrix or a mis-communication between my parents Santa and his elves, because as my sister and I got half way down our stockings, it became apparent that I was opening presents for her and she, presents for I. We checked the wrapping paper and sure enough, my pile consisted of 'E's and hers of 'F's. We swapped stockings and continued unwrapping, only to find the same mistake- I was once again opening things she had asked for and her unwrapping things I had asked for. We realised that Santa must have wrapped things in the wrong wrapping paper then and elf had come along and labeled the presents wrapped in my sister's allocated wrapping paper 'E' and those in my allocated wrapping paper 'F'. It was a very exhausting Christmas morning and me and my sister spent most of it trying to decide who got what and our parents helpfully suggesting what Santa might have intended for each of us- without sounding like they knew who's was who's.

At the end of the day, Christmas is about being around people to celebrate what you believe to be the meaning of Christmas and we were doing that. In fact, I'm going to put these mistakes down to the fact that we were probably getting a bit too into the holiday spirit and so got jumbled about presents and recipients, relatives and pajamas, and gifts and bin bags.

Also, if you've ever wondered how slightly dippy Christian children write their Christmas lists, check out my video here, called 'The Girl Who Prayed'.