Growing up ... (continued)

...  Holidays were always at our house because we had the biggest house that able to accommodate all of our relatives and their families, all our cousins, aunts, uncles and grandparents.  I would be soooo excited for that special morning, not only to open all our gifts and to see what Santa brought us, but because I loved it when all of us would get together and spend time the way we did when I was a little boy.  All the laughter that was shared by all of us.  It took forever for all us to open all of our gifts because we would go around in a circle and one by one open the presents, good grief, the thrill killed me, because as kids, you just want to be able to rip open all at once because of the anticipation of it all has built up for sooo long!  There was always around 50-60 people at our house on Christmas morning and mom would always get us cinnamen rolls for the morning and as we were eating those, waiting for all our relatives to get to our house, mom would start on the huge Christmas dinner that would await us that night, turkey, ham and all the trimmings that goes with it.  Mom would always make comments about it, but deep down, I know she loved doing it and that we were all together as a family on that special day, and as soon as my aunts and grandma's arrived at the house, they would all be in the kitchen cooking and she loved being with them, gossiping and laughing as they always did.  Family is very important to her, Mom is so much like her dad, my grandfather, in that way .  I believe I have taken on that trait as well.  I really do miss all of the family events we used to do.  Times are much more different now as we have all gotten older and no longer have those times together I long for and miss so terribly.  I believe that is why I have become so depressed lately and have wanted to start writing this all down, so that I can remember all the wonderful times we all shared together as a family.  It is so very important to me to remember all the good times. 

 Not only did Christmas bring all of us together on that day for food, gifts etc. we also tons of snow and we lived on a hill, above the city, and we would all go sledding after unwrapping our presents, all of us cousins, which where soooo many of us at the time.  The neighborhood where we grew up in also had so many other children our age, my sister and cousins, that we would all meet and trudge to the park in our snowsuits and huge moon boots, we could barely move in them, bundled up to so that the only part showing was our eyes, but mom did not want us catching a cold, and with our inner tubes, sleds and anything else that we could slide down the mountain on that could catch enough speed to give us a thrill ride down that beast of a hill.  Some of the old kids in the neighborhood would create this huge jump in the middle of that giant hill and poor water on it so that it would be ice and hard as a rock.  Sometimes, we would tie all the inner tubes together and go down all at once, good times!  It was so cold, we could only stay for a few hours, and then head back home, all drenched and frozen by that time, sitting by the huge fireplace was the only thing we could do to get warm.  By the time we had gotten back home, all the men were playing cards, or watching football and the tables had been set up by this time for dinner, and if anyone can relate, then you know that the kids sat at the "kiddy" tables which in our case, were three little card tables, because we were not able to sit with the "adults".  For me, dinner was just as exciting as was opening presents on that morning, I loved to eat and the house was full of all different kinds of yummy smells, mainly the turkey and of the ham.  My grandma's would always make their homemade pies and bring them as well.  We always had so much food.  When dinner was over, I remember all of playing this game that my mom's dad, my grandpa loved, which was a dice game called 4-5-6.  I LOVED that game! It was only game I knew how to play and was easy enough for me to understand at my age. 

... more to come ...