A long time ago, when my children were quite small, too small to notice such things even, I would sit up all night on Christmas Eve wrapping everything in tissue paper that was destined for their stockings. At the bottom of each stocking, (which, by the way, I had knitted for them when they were babies), was a tangerine or clementine, a walnut, and a handful of chocolate coins. I made tissue~bags full of M&Ms: 6 green ones for Hannah, 6 green ones for Emi, and 6 green ones for Soe. Then I'd start on another colour, dishing out the exact amount of each colour...to be fair! I was quite mad! There were wind~up toys for the bath, Hello Kitty pencils and paper and envelopes and toothbrushes and coloured pencils and combs. Hello Kitty stuff was a hot item in the stockings! They all had exactly the same in each of their stockings, so careful was I that one wouldn't think that they had been out~stockinged by her sister. After they were all stuffed, around 4:30 in the morning, I would oh so carefully lay them at the foot of their beds, remembering that wonderful feeling, years before, of the weight of the filled stockings across the foot of our beds at Marston Magna! Tiptoeing everso quietly, I found my cozy bed, where my slumbering best friend lay, quite oblivious to all the hard work that had gone into this annual affair! But alas, no sooner had my exhausted head snuggled up into the soft pillows, 'twas then that the pattering of little feet came running, accompanied by squeals of joy: "He's been! He's been! Wake up, come on, wake up!!" .... My girls are grown now. Sapphie is going to be 2 the day after Christmas, and her little brother or sister will be here in early February. My 3 girls have so much to look forward to! Pattering feet on Christmas Day in the morning!
