I woke up suddenly to the blaring alarm. It must have been 5:30. It was still fully dark outside. Aimee must have woken up too because the alarm was now off putting the entire house in complete silence. I knew the other three were up too because everyone was stirring.
"Merry Christmas!" Aimee said.
"Merry Christmas." We all replied in groggy voices.
I got up and started folding up the blankets that I slept with while others also either folded their own blankets or stumbled off to the bathroom.
Eventually, we were all ready to go wake up mom and dad. It didn't take long, we've been doing this same routine for most of our lives.
"Cover your eyes like this," Cherise said as Aimee and Cherise started to lead us through the family room. She put her hands around her eyes like a cup, forcing blinders on herself. We all followed suit with no questions or arguments. This was also a normal thing if we had to walk past the tree and presents. We also did this on Easter so we didn't see any clues, eggs or baskets.
Picture from gatesmillsvillage.com.
We trekked through the family room, past the kitchen and down the small hall towards the parent's room like a bunch of ducklings following their mother.
Once we got to the room, it was like a free-for-all. I attacked my dad, because he was always the hardest to get out of bed. Skylar tried to help me, but everyone else woke mom up.
Mom got up quickly and went to their bathroom to make sure her hair was in order with Aimee and Cherise. Taylor joined Skylar and I in waking my dad up. We knew he was awake, but he would fight it as long as he could. He did it every year.
After a little while, the girls would join us in waking dad up, but he wouldn't actually move until mom told him to get up. By that point, it seemed she was almost ready for the day.
"Alright, I'm up," my dad said as he sat up in bed. "I'm going to go shower."
"No, dad!" All of us kids said at once. He said this every year and never actually did it, but we still didn't want to risk having to wait longer.
Once he actually got out of bed, the rest of us would go into the kitchen where a spread of sweets was found. It always included orange sticks, homemade fudge, Cadbury chocolates and hard candy that I've only ever seen at Christmas time.
We snacked on these sweets for a bit until dad came out and joined us. Now it was time to go open presents.
"Let's say a family prayer," mom said. We would always pray that we would remember Christ and His life on this special day.
Picture from ldswallpapers.com.
After the prayer, we walked together until we were just outside the room where the tree and gifts were found.
"Dad's going to go check if Santa came," mom said.
Dad walked into the room while we all waited with anticipation, but patiently.
He would be gone for a few minutes before returning.
"Santa came!" He exclaimed as he came back to where we were.
We all walked in and dad directed us to our presents. Santa always separated our presents for each person at a place to sit. The gifts from family members for other family members still sat under the tree.
"Ok, Skylar will start," mom said.
We always started with the youngest and went to the oldest by opening one gift at a time until we finished Santa's presents.
The only free-for-all present was our stockings, which were also laid out by the Santa gifts. It always had a chocolate orange, which was always one of my favorite traditions.
"Alright, grab all the presents under the tree and pass them out," mom directed.
When they were all passed out, we would start the whole process again starting with Skylar.
Once the presents were all opened, we would set up our toys or games or whatever gifts we may have gotten and just play. We would have a spread of random food to snack on. This food usually included a cheese ball, toffee, Chex mix, ham, rolls and other random goodies.
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