Wondering about my Wanderings

The Christmas Gift

I pondered what to give my brothers and sisters for Christmas. I hate to wait to the last minute and I wanted to make it personal. Here is a letter I will send with my gifts that I will send this week.

Dear Brothers and sisters,

I thought real hard about what I might send for Christmas this year. As usual my finances were limited. The first thing that came to mind was a symbol that we all know well that might be there to remind us of what Mom's death meant to us. It might even lead to one of the children or adults to want to share their own story about what mom meant to them and spill over to sharing what the they enjoy about each other and the Christmas story that they have come to know.

By this time I am feeling all manner of excitement. I knew just what I would do, I would send each of you a commemorative ornament. It did not take long before I looked and discovered it was well out of my price range. Then I happened upon a Christian bookstore totally lost, but hoping to get some idea of how all of us in our own way could celebrate a memory. I asked a young lady if she had any items that had a lighthouse kind of thing. She had no idea what I was even wanting. She immediately took me to the book marks that had scriptures and pictures of a lighthouse on them. I was emotional to think I found something!

Well you know how a mind kind of spills over into a dreamlike state. I woke up in the morning and thought to myself: Why couldn't the bookmarks serve as a Christmas ornament? Therefore they could have a dual purpose. They could have an ornamental value on Christmas and be used as a bookmark after that.
I was proud of myself for even thinking about it. With the bookmark/ornament I have added some stories, poems and an idea that you might adopt or even pass on to someone else. I call it a story tree. The idea is to celebrate the family unit. Maybe there could be a different ornament that each family can look at and remember. It could be something to build family. We finally see together what brought us together and keeps us together.
I love you and am proud of you!!
Love #1 brother
Gary Peterson