One Holiday Season Down Part I

This was our first Christmas without my husband with us, so it has been a difficult time, and has taking me some time to process everything before I could share it.

I have never experienced such an outpouring of kindness from strangers and friends in my whole life. I have been given the Gift of Gratitude on a level few will ever get to experience. A colleague at work gave me some money to buy my children Christmas gifts, and I decided that I would give the money to the kids so they could buy gifts for each other. What a double gift that was! Not only did the kids have gifts from each other to open, but we also had the best time in the world shopping for each other and spending the time together really enjoying the true meaning of the season...the joy of giving to others.

My husband had been able to make a request through another charitable organization, gifts that he would like to give the kids from him. They contacted me, I fine tuned his gift requests and made arrangements for the gifts to be dropped off at the house. A local church group dropped off the gifts the Sunday before Christmas and I was so overwhelmed with their kindness. I hugged those kind ladies like they were my closest family, and felt such warmth and gratitude, but had no other way to express what I was feeling. Christmas morning when the gifts were opened, they were so much more than I could have ever imagined.

At the last minute, I had another request for a list from the kids what they would like, and another kind family came through with some additional, wonderful gifts. Even I had one or two to open Christmas day. A few gift cards were passed my way as well which made for a nice holiday dinner.

So the gifts that other people gave to us can never have a price placed on them. They were absolutely priceless on so many levels and I made sure my kids understood that most of our Christmas came from the kindness of strangers. What a lesson to learn and I hope that they can take this experience with them.

The highlight of the holiday was from the kindness of others. It helped make a very difficult time a little better. All I can offer is a big thank you and the opportunity in the future to be able to pay it forward.