‘Tis the season to give each other goodies (but I really wish we wouldn’t)

I know that some of you out there enjoy giving and receiving neighbor gifts at Christmas time. In fact, right now you’re putting the finishing touches on your homemade, hand-dipped chocolates or your caramel macadamia nut popcorn balls before deftly wrapping them in cellophane and gold French ribbon and delivering them to snow-covered homes all [...]

And the Soul Felt Its Worth

I sat in my car, my hands gripping the steering wheel, glaring at the front end loader inching its way across the road. Perhaps the sheer force of my gaze could speed the thing up? But no. It lurched forward, then back, then forward, then back, performing what appeared to be a [...]

Great Expectations

“I’ve got the greatest gift for you!” my husband tells our daughter. I shoot a glare at him, and if looks could kill, I’d be spending the holidays in the slammer.
Usually we both subscribe to the Marjorie Hinckley school of thought, where low expectations are the key to happiness. At Christmas time, however, we [...]

The Customary Christmas

My first Christmas with my husband was a tempestuous one. Instead of exchanging romantic gifts in front of a roaring fire as I’d always dreamed, we spent most of the holidays arguing and nursing hurt feelings. Christmas quickly disintegrated into a “my family” vs. “your family” throwdown (my family’s way of doing things being [...]

The Spirit of 6 Year Old Giving

I was six. My mother wrote on the fold-over envelope all the names of the members our family, tucked the $5 bill inside the envelope, and closed the pouch. I hurriedly zipped it into my purple backpack alongside my pink My Little Pony lunch box. My blond pig tails bounced as I skipped out for the bus. This was to be my first [...]

Alms

The Relief Society President held up a small, stuffed animal with button eyes. “We will be making these for an orphanage in Honduras,” she said with a little too much delight. The sisters gathered together with ready sewing machines and willing hands. My friend’s heart sank with those words. It plummeted further as she realized [...]

No Respecter of Ornaments

“Do we have to put them all up this year?,” my husband grumbles as he shuffles down a few trees and a dozen freezing cold boxes from the attic.
“Yes, all of them!,” I assert, with some insistence. “In the Graff house we are no respecter of ornaments. It’s a matter of principle.”
Everyone is welcome under our [...]

The Stories of Christmas

As we we hauled the Christmas boxes up from the basement this week my children whipped into a frenzy of excitement– the stockings! the ornaments! the ribbons! the creche! the books! Poor little people, they hardly knew which to partake of first.
But once the tree was up and the stockings hung, every child hauled a [...]

Black Sabbath

My roommate in college used to joke that everything I brought from home was possessed.

I Believe in Santa Claus. But, I didn’t used to.

As a brand new mom, I thought it might be better to skip the whole Santa thing, telling my children from the beginning the truth about those stuffed stockings and wrapped packages.