When Christmas Was a Surprise
Somewhere in a garage, a backyard shed, the back of a cupboard or a box in the roof, there is a Christmas card from 1978 that is still covered in glitter. Open it and a few flecks of glitter drift out, as if no time has passed at all.
Remember the cards of the seventies and eighties? Snowy villages, shimmering stars, a robin with a sparkling breast. For me, seeing glitter on an old Christmas card is enough. I’m straight back there.
Images of vintage Christmas cards via @sadderlizards on Instagram
At school, we made Christmas decorations with copious amounts of glue and glitter. It was the making as much as the finished masterpiece: ordinary materials becoming something special because Christmas was coming. Glitter has belonged to Christmas in my mind ever since.
Here in Australia, those snowy Christmas scenes were a delightful mismatch. We could be sweltering through a summer Christmas, fans on, thongs on, the pavement too hot to cross, while the cards showed snowdrifts, frosted pines and robins fluffed up against the cold. Dusted in glitter, of course, because how else do you do snow?
The pictures didn’t have to match the weather outside. They just had to make us feel something.
The reality, in my house at least, involved rather more work than the cards suggested. The women were in the kitchen preparing a lavish Christmas meal with more variety of roast meats than your local butcher, all in the height of summer. For reasons that remain unclear to me, my Dad and Pa would always carve the meats to much delight. Then came the cleaning up afterwards: again, the women at the kitchen sink while the men settled in with a beer and discussed the much-anticipated Boxing Day cricket Test. There was always frustration, loudly aired over the sink. And yet, year after year, it happened again.
I can remember the magic and still remember that. Even as a child, I was aware of the work that sat behind Christmas.
Christmas morning had its own rules, too. We’d wake our parents at 5 am, sometimes earlier, vibrating with excitement, and our mother would not be moved: before we laid eyes on a single thing Santa had left, we were to get showered and dressed. Santa's effort deserved better than our pyjamas and messy bed hair.
We called it “doing a Maggie Tabberer”, after the Australian style icon and original 'influencer', who was always impeccably turned out, even, we suspected, at 5 am. As a public figure, Maggie seemed larger than life throughout my childhood and young adult years.
Eventually, my sister and I pushed back on Mum's rule, but we still had to wait until Mum and Dad had done a Maggie Tabberer too. Mum stuck to her guns every Christmas for the rest of her life.
Mum passed away in 2018, and every Christmas since, we ask each other, half laughing, whether we should do a Maggie Tabberer. You'll be pleased to hear that our dear old Dad, now 86, continues to honour the tradition.
That’s what these little Christmas triggers can do. A few flecks of glitter, a familiar phrase, and suddenly you’re remembering not just a day, but the people in it. I don’t need to scatter fresh glitter to feel it now. Seeing it on an old card is enough. The sparkle has become a time machine.
What is it for you? The decorations coming out of their battered box? A particular song? Someone’s handwriting on a gift tag? Or that delicious feeling of seeing a parcel with your name on it and having absolutely no idea what was inside?
Perhaps it brings back the magic. Perhaps a person you miss. Perhaps a family ritual that still makes you laugh. It doesn’t have to be a perfect Christmas to be a memory worth keeping.
A little room to be surprised again
When you’re the woman making Christmas happen, there isn’t always much left that you haven’t planned yourself. You can love doing it and still miss being surprised.
There’s a difference between knowing exactly what’s in every parcel and receiving something you haven’t chosen, organised and wrapped yourself. Between making the day special for everyone else and having someone think about what might delight you.
That feeling is part of what’s behind To: Me, Love Me, my personally curated surprise gift. A little room to receive. A chance to enjoy something chosen for you, rather than adding another thing to your own Christmas organising.
But first, I’d love to hear what you remember.
Take a moment to think back. What small thing made Christmas feel special to you? Something you saw, smelled, heard or did that still takes you straight back?
Write to me and tell me. It doesn’t have to be a grand story.
Mine starts with glue and glitter.