Dad's Rules

All parents have their various rules regarding when/how presents are opened. At a birthday party it might be before or after the cake. This could be a tradition or whatever is easiest in the schedule of keeping every ones attention.

I don't remember rules regarding opening our presents at Birthday parties (our tradition was the cake...another post for another day). And our parents definitely didn't have to do anything to stir up our excitement for opening presents - no matter what the occasion. Although they did tell us the story of Santa, I had reasoned that out of existence by the time I was five and honestly don't remember the Christmas' that I focused on anything except the gift of Jesus and the treasure of our family. Lil' sis and I looked forward to discovering what special finds our Mommy and Daddy had purchased or made for us. It didn't matter how many or how few there were under the tree - we knew that each one was handpicked for us because of the unconditional love they had for their girls. Due to these factors, and for other reasons that I might not be aware of, Dad had specific rules about the process of opening presents Christmas morning.

Daddy's Rules:

1. We were allowed to open our stocking presents without them as described in this post, but we weren't allowed near the tree. I am sure there were many reasons for this, but believe it or not, one of them was that my dad wanted the lights on the tree to be on before anyone else in the family saw it. Too cute!
2. Dad took pictures or video of us, one by one, coming out of our rooms to the room where the tree was.
3. Dad and Mom needed a glass of egg nog while presents were opened. (No...it wasn't spiked. My family just likes egg nog. As lil' sis and I got older, we joined in too)
4. Dad would hand out the presents to everyone and we would open the gifts one at a time...giving attention to whoever was opening. The only exception to this is when lil' sis and I received a similar present. In those instances, we were allowed to open our gifts at the same time.

The following is how lil' sis and I stretched the letter of the law when possible with each of the rules.

Rule #1: The impact of this rule was dependent on the location of the tree. Sometimes the tree was downstairs which meant that we would walk down the stairs and look at the tree from the bottom stair. Usually the tree was set up in the living room on the same floor as our bedrooms (think bi-level home). To eliminate any confusion for his daughters, my dad elaborated on this rule telling us that we were not allowed on the carpet of the living room. This was not a problem when mom and dad were up and ready to go by the time we were done opening our stocking presents and thanking them for our new toothbrushes and toothpaste and trying a piece of the wrapped candy. But, for those times when they weren't ready, the delay was difficult and became a challenge. We, of course, obeyed the letter of the law, but stretched the purpose. Here's how. We made sure that we did not touch the carpet once. We first used the cast iron railing to walk from the foyer to the living room. From the railing we could get onto one of the chairs and then from there we could get to the couch with or without the help of the coffee table. Once we reached the couch we were home free. We could then look at the tree close-up. The crazy thing in all of this is that once we got there we didn't do anything...just looked at the pretty nametags that mom hand-made (for her, this was an art form - we actually would save some of the nametags) and noted what presents we were going to be able to open and which ones we hoped to open first. We didn't pick up the presents or shake them - we knew that was strictly forbidden!!! Once the destination of the couch was reached, we turned around and made our way back to the foyer, without stepping on the carpet, and then ran down the hall to see if mom and dad were out of bed yet...

Rule #2: There really wasn't a way to get out of this rule. Just picture this - two girls in pj's (some handmade by mom) with hair down to their waists, sitting on mom and dad's bed getting their hair brushed and put up (hair pulled back is what we called it). Is anyone going to believe that we woke up like that?!? Please. But that was my mom. We needed to be presentable for the camera.

Rule #3: When we were younger we simply had to wait. As we got older, we poured the egg nog for everyone (and took care of our presentation for rule #2). All mom and dad had to do was get out of bed and come down the hall.

Rule #4: Again, no real way to get around this rule but I have a couple of funny memories. One such memory is the year that Dad gave lil' sis and I a package and when we opened it, we each received an outfit to a doll that we didn't own yet! Oh boy, were we excited! Just imagine the decibel reached from our squeals of excitement. Now we knew one of the presents we were going to receive! My poor Dad was so concerned that he wouldn't give us the correct present. (Apparently Mom hadn't labeled the presents that year or Dad was having difficulty distinguishing the labels.) Two or three presents later, I received the Mandy doll and lil' sis received the Jenny doll. My Dad's mistake didn't decrease the fun we had with our dolls that year but it certainly added humor to the home..."Dad, are you sure that I can open this present now???"

Simms and I are entering the "rules" phase. Currently our main rule is "no one goes downstairs before we are all up and ready". Everything is downstairs (colonial style home) so I don't have to worry about rule #1. Yes, we do take video of the boys coming down the stairs but, let's face it, it doesn't take long to comb their hair and I am totally ok with putting my hair up into a pony tail (I still have to be somewhat presentable...bed head is just not ok!) but that takes a mere five minutes. I do have egg nog ready for Grammie and Poppy when they arrive to spend time with the boys before lil' sis' family comes over. Finally, we have kept the tradition of rule #4 but Simms and I take turns.

In spite of the "rules", the most important thing to me is that our boys learn to appreciate everything they receive - no matter how big or small - and that they would recognize that any recognized value of the gifts they receive cannot compare to the greatest gift ever given to each of us...JESUS! Do they truly comprehend this at 5 and 2? Probably not. Truth be told, do any of us really comprehend this? As we mature, our understanding may increase but overall I think the answer remains the same - probably not.