Wow, what a beautiful memory--I can see that tree-top...

Musick, thank you for this thread. Oh, yes! The anticipation! One Christmas Eve, I went to bed, woke up, and went in to the parlor, where my aunt and uncle and parents were sitting around the stove, talking. I was wild to get to my stocking and presents--then my mother informed me it was ten p.m.! I'd been asleep less than an hour.

My most memorable Christmas was when I was in 6th grade (ten years old). I got two very large presents--a sewing box, a real, grown-up one, and a coiled, plush snake, that I slept with till I went to college--it was just like someone's arm around me. And I got one HUGE present--a new suitcase! Those 3 big ones outshone everything else, in my eyes.