An Unexpected Gift

Today I got the best Christmas gift I could ever imagine.  I have my Diva, sleeping in her bed while I play Santa.  In all our years together, I've never had Diva, or any other child, in my home on Christmas morning.  I never thought I would, honestly.  Diva and Squeak are the babies of the family, and I really thought this year would be the year they decided to stop believing in Santa.  I got a little teary last year after the holidays, thinking that the little ones had just breezed through the last year of Christmas magic.  Thankfully, I was wrong.

Now: listen to this and tell me there is no such thing as fate.  Last week I went to the eye doctor, and on Monday Walker and I went to the mall.  We had some last minute Christmas shopping, we needed new cell phones, and I wanted to get new eye glasses.  Only I forgot my prescription. The tech at the eye place tried to call my doctor, but sat on hold so long that by the time someone came on the line, the doctor had gone home.  I had no choice but to go back to the mall later in the week.

I was less than thrilled. Who wants to go to the mall during the last week before Christmas?  And now I have to go back?  But I had money coming from my insurance that had to be used before the end of the year so I sucked it up and we went back on Thursday.  As we went down the mall I noticed that several stores were having last minute sales.  Good sales.  At  good stores.  Of course we looked around.   And of course I found a few things I knew Diva would love.  Despite the fact that I already had her gift at home, we bought her a couple things.  I hid them in the house with no particular plan of when to give them to her. 

After the mall, I had an hour to wait before I could go to work.  I decided to head to Target, just to kill some time.  I mean, it would take 20 minutes to get home, and another 20 to get back to the office, but Target was five minutes away.  No harm cruising around there, right?  Surprisingly, the store wasn't busy. Not surprisingly, I found a few more little things for Diva.  A small box of chocolates, a small bottle of fragrance popular with girls her age, some fancy Christmas socks....Of course, I purchased those things, too.


So on Christmas Eve morning, when Diva called asking if she could stay over, I said a little prayer of thanks.  If I hadn't had to go back to the mall that second time, I wouldn't have been there for the sales, and I wouldn't have a Santa gift for Diva.  If I hadn't had to kill an hour at Target, I'd have nothing for her stocking.  Last spring, when our basement flooded again and again, I lost all my wrapping supplies.  Around Thanksgiving I bought one roll of paper and no bows, cause I always pick those up after Christmas at 70% off.  Except earlier on Christmas Eve I went down into the basement and found one roll of old paper that survived the water damage because it never got put away.  I managed to find one bow, too.  So Santa's gifts are wrapped in different paper than mine.  Funny how things work out......

And then, for the first time, I got to help my little one put together a plate of treats for Santa.  We watched the NORAD Santa tracker for a while, seeing him zip over Africa and Europe and South America before hitting the States.  I got to tuck a very excited little girl into bed with all her favorite stuffed animals.  And I got to stuff a stocking and write a letter signed, "Santa".  It does not get better than this.   

Merry Christmas to all my blogger friends.  I hope you are feeling as blessed by this season as I am right now.