Christmas Contest

[TF Admin]

HOHOHO!

I'm playing Santa Clause! I have 5 $20 gift certificates that I'm giving away.

All five will be given away on Wednesday, Dec 20.

The five $20 GC's are:

Bed, Bath, and Beyond
Best Buy
Logan's Roadhouse
Olive Garden
O'Charley's

Here's how to win:

Write a humorous, cute, or touching real-life christmas anecdote/story. Your story must be more than 100 words. It must be original, please don't plagerize!

Send your story through our PM system to me. Your PM SUBJECT SHOULD BE: CHRISTMAS CONTEST ENTRY

At the end of your story include your name and address (needed in case you win)

All entries MUST be received by 10PM December 19, 2006

I will read all entries and choose the five winners. I will randomly draw the gift certificates, and randomly draw the winners names from two boxes.

Winning entries will be published (minus personal details) on Wednesday, December 20, 2006

Certificates will be mailed on Thursday, December 21.

Any questions?

[zipzam]

admin said:

All five will be given away on Wednesday, Nov 20.

that's a LONG time to wait!

i know, you meant december 20th.

[granny2young]

can everyone participate in this one, or is mods prohibited from entering?

[TF Admin]

We'll let everyone participate in this one.

TF

[missfairy]

Do they have to be all good-feeling? Most of my Christmas stories are bad.

I love Christmas. I don't let the numerous bad experiences in the past taint my Christmas spirit, but alas it gives me very little to work with.

[TF Admin]

MissFairy, just give me a story you think is appropriate. It doesn't have to be all wine and roses, but it should enumerate the Christmas spirit in some fashion, as this is the purpose of this exercise. Good luck.

TF

[TF Admin]

You have until 10PM Tuesday Night to get your entries in for this contest. I am enjoying the heck out of reading these...so send them in.

TF

[TF Admin]

It's over. Watch this space tomorrow for the winner's announcements!

TF

[TF Admin]

This is our final contest for 2006. It's also the final contest at our current home. And while we did not get as many entries as I thought we would, we have 3 winners nonetheless.

cntryldyx3 is our first winner. She wins a Bed, Bath, and Beyond $20.00 GC. Here's her Christmas Story:

Seven year old boys have tender hearts,especially when it comes to Santa Claus.Some older kids had told my brother that there was no Santa Claus. Christmas was just a little dim for him that year. Try as we might,he would just not cheer up. We did everything we could to convince him that the boys had lied to him. On Christmas eve we were blessed with snow and ice. My fourteen year old mind went to work. In the wee hours of the morning I slipped out of the house, found a thin piece of wood about two inches wide and laid the straightest "sleigh tracks" you have ever seen in the snow, complete with reindeer tracks. A few hours later I woke him up with my "discovery". The smile on his face and the sparkle in his eyes were worth everything.

Our second winner is missfairy. She has won a $20 GC to Logan's Roadhouse. Here is her Christmas Story:

The Christmas Sillies

I knew I couldn't get away with writing about how Christmas ended in disappointment most of the time for me. When trying to come up with a story, I drew a blank. I couldn't think of a single story that contained a happy memory or funny anectdote. Yet I always maintain my Christmas spirit. From October through December is always my favorite time of year! I love Christmas carols. (My radio is temporarily tuned to only Sunny 93.3.) I love buying and making things for people I love. (I am all about some crafts!) I also love writing (and 20$ gift certificates!) so how could I resist taking this contest as a challenge? So for days now, I've been mulling over what to make this little essay about. Today, it dawned on me. Deep inside of me, I found one of the things that always gave me my sanity during Christmas and it all started when my sister and I were little...

(Insert squiggly lines as if this was a movie.)

Any other time of year, I was mean to her like a big sister was supposed to be. During Christmas, we shared and fed off each other's excitement. Our yearly tradition was to watch "Muppet Christmas Carol" (Hush, it's a great movie!) on Christmas Eve just before bed. (Later we also added Nightmare Before Christmas to that.) Around 9 or 10 pm, the parental units insisted we go to bed for "Santa." This one time per year, I welcomed my sister into my room to sleep in the bed with me. Mom would shut the door so we couldn't peek down the hallway. But being so excited, we could NOT sleep. We'd wear ourselves down with any number of things. We'd sing Christmas Carols. We'd discuss what we thought we were getting. We'd play made-up games, like the Christmas Carol game. This one would go on to be our favorite. You'd have to go back and forth through the alphabet, thinking up a Christmas song that started with each letter. If you couldn't think of one, you'd have to make one up on the spot. Hilarious at times. You ended up with mostly songs to the tune of others like "Frog-Butts Roasting On An Open Fire" or "Kringle Bells". It seemed like an eternity till morning. Eventually, we'd be so delerious with the giggles, we'd pass out. Of course, we still woke up Mom at around 6:00 am when we were good and ready to open those presents. (Before 6:00 am, she'd just grumble at us to go back to bed.) Those are the best memories I have of Christmas. Not just because of presents or sillyness, but because I was spending time with the person that became my favorite family member. (Eventually, when she was a teenager, I even had custody of her for a short time!) Now we fast forward in time...

(Squiggly lines again.)

This year my sister got married and had a baby. (Though, not necessarily in that order.) I was told that this Christmas we wouldn't be spending that Christmas Eve together because she's doing something with her husband's family. This depresses me in some ways, but there's so much more to look forward to now. There's a new child in the picture. A child to start new traditions with and the idea of watching her grow and carry them on makes me positively giddy.

This story may not be what you were looking for, but I assure you it was worth it to write it. The joy it brought me to relive these things in words is immeasurable.

Our final winner is granny2young. She wins the O'Charley's $20 GC. Her story is a tear-jerker:

My Christmas Angel

December 1983, a Christmas I will never forget, a Christmas that taught me the true meaning of Christmas, a Christmas that changed my life forever, a Christmas that started a tradition in my family that still exist 23 years later.

I was a young mother with 4 year old and 1 year old girls, newly divorced. I was a single mother, raising two girls alone, working a back breaking low-paying job in a sawmill factory just to pay the rent. There was rarely anything left over. It was a new world and whole new experience for me. A life I never want to live again.

Christmas was fast approaching, and for months my 4 year old had spotted a Barbie Dream House. It's all she talked about for weeks. Someone would mention Christmas or Santa Claus and her eyes gleamed and she proudly boasted, I can't wait, cause I am getting a Barbie Dream House. The entire month of December I put every penny I could spare back to get her that doll house. It was $99, which was like a million bucks back then. We had an usually hard winter that year and two days before Christmas our gas was cut off for nonpayment. There went everything I had put back to get the doll house and I was broke and not another check before Christmas. My parents were in Michigan that year and couldn't help. My grandparents lived on a fixed income and could not help either. There was nothing I could do, except pray.

I explained to her that sometimes Santa could not get everything kids wanted and told her that Santa had told me that he couldn't get her the dollhouse, but he was going to bring her something nice. I remember her words so clear. Her big dark beautiful eyes looked into mine that night as we sat in front of the fireplace burning a pasteboard box to stay warm and conserve gas, sparks dancing in her eyes, and she said "oh mommy, I know I am getting my Barbie Dream House cause I talked to Santa and he said he would bring it if I would be good, and I have been so good. I fed sissy and I didn't cry when I fell off my trike!" She just didn't understand. She could not be convinced (or would not accept) that she might not get it.

As Christmas Eve approached and I put the girls to bed for the night, I tried to talk to her again, trying to ease the pain and prepare her for the pain she was going to feel in just a few short hours, but she would not hear of it. She had faith. Faith I didn't have. I had prayed and prayed and I still had found no way to get it and even if I could it was too late now. Even if $100 bill dropped from heaven above all the stores were closed now. It was a done deal, or so I thought. God had heard my prayers and felt my breaking heart, I just didn't know it yet.

At 11 pm that Christmas Eve I sat all alone in the floor in front of the little desk top 2 ft. pitiful Christmas tree sitting little rattlers and teethers out for the baby. As I took out the Barbie doll I had gotten Amanda I prayed one last time for good measure, but this time I prayed for peace, not for me, but for my daughter. I prayed that she would understand and not cry and not hate me. I felt like such a failure. I think I even prayed that she would love the Barbie doll even without the house, as I clutched it in my hands.

I remember crying as I kneeled down that night. I was startled by a knock on the door. For a few minutes I was terrified, as we were not living in the best of neighborhoods and many things happened around there. I had several locks on the door and sit there watching those locks, listening to the knocks and I then began to pray for safety. The knocks continued and didn't go away. I could only see a shadow from the window, it appeared to be a very large man. I was terrified. As the third set of knocks began, I stood close to the door and asked "who is it." A very deep gruff voice returned, "it's me Lloyd Scott, I have the kids something for Christmas." I remembered the name vaguely, as he was a friend of my mother. I had met him on occasion but didn't know him well. I debated about what to do for a second, and slowly opened the door hoping I was doing the right thing. There stood this huge man holding a pie and a bag, and beside him on the steps was...............you guessed it..... A big pink box displaying the Barbie Dream House!!!!!!!!!!! I cried, I laughed, I hugged. I even fell to my knees in disbelief and just held the box.

After a good 5 minutes of standing outside in my pajama's in the cold I invited him inside. He told me that a little birdy had told him that a little girl wanted a dream house so bad and he was playing Santa. I told him he was not Santa, he was a real Christmas angel. To this day I still have no idea how, where, when, or why although I have often wandered how he knew. He brought toys for the baby and a glass angel ornament for the tree for me. We started putting the dollhouse together so it would be the first thing she saw the next morning. After the entire pie and many cups of hot chocolate, just as the sun started to rise it was all put together and on display. It was another miracle that we didn't wake the kids up that night, cause some stomping and yelling was involved in trying to follow those backwards directions! I asked him to stay and let me wake the girls so he could share in their joy, but he didn't. He said he had had enough joy in getting it there. I can't hardly type this now, all these years later as I reflect back that Christmas morning when she came into that living room. Joy beyond measure.

Many things have happened since that Christmas. Lloyd has gone on to be with the Lord. He is gone, but he left a legacy and a new tradition in our family that continues to this day. I now have 3 girls instead of 2 and I tell them the story of my Christmas angel. I now tell my grandchildren, as they are getting old enough. The ornament that he brought had 18 glass angels on it. Every year at Christmas I cut one of those angels off and give it away to someone who needs a Christmas angel. Sometimes it comes with toys, sometimes money, and sometimes just the story. I ask them to continue Lloyd's love, and when they get on their feet and can to pass the angel on to someone less fortunate, that they too would be blessed as I have through my life.

Now I have 2 GC's left, so I will hang onto them for the next contest at our new home.

I'd like to thank all 3 ladies for taking the time to share these wonderful stories with all of us. Merry Christmas to all of you and Happy Holidays from me and TUPELOFORUMS.COM!

TFADMIN

[granny2young]

beautiful stories ladies. My cup runneth over as my grandmother would say. God Bless you all and Merry Christmas! Will see you all in our new home tomorrow.

[missfairy]

yay i win something. *dances around merrily*

[cntryldyx3]

Very good stories,ladies.This is what really makes Christmas,remembering the past joys and looking forward to new ones.

[DarkenedSoul]

Congratz Ladies, Good Job.