I am getting a Christmas package ready to send off to my missionary sister and as I do my mind wanders to happy Christmas memories that I experienced while I got to serve. Here is one of them:
Sister Barss and me at a dinner appointment, shortly before Christmas. The mother of the family that we were eating with gave us these two sweater vests as Christmas presents. Even though it wasn't really my style, I was touched by how kind it was. However, her teenage sons started teasing her with comments like, "Gee, Mom. Did you get a matching one for Grandma, too?" and I couldn't stop laughing. She was a good sport.
I got to serve with one of my favorite companions, Sister Barss for the 4 1/2 months leading up to Christmas. Boy was that a treat! There are so many things that I love about her, but her thoughtfulness comes first to mind. Sister Barss was especially excited for Christmas, as she would be returning home just before the holiday and would get to spend it with her family. However, before she left, she wanted to do something special to bring in the true meaning of Christmas to those we loved. She decided that during her morning gospel study, she would compile pictures from past Ensigns and match them with excerpts from the book, Jesus the Christ, to best tell the nativity story. The plan was to separate her findings into twelve installments and give them with a little binder so that people could use it to count down the twelve days of Christmas.
We missionaries had a little over a hundred dollars put into our missionary spending account at the very beginning of each month(mine was paid for by my dad). I knew that I wanted to save some of my December funds to get little presents to send home to family, but I figured that since Sister Barss was going to all sorts of trouble and effort to make this special gift, I could help out with the financing. I told her that I would split the costs with her, figuring that I would be spending around twenty dollars.
All November long she toiled away at her project. I had no doubt that it was going to be lovely. It better have been with all the time she put into it! On the very first preparation day in December, after we got our allowance, we headed off to Office Depot to get everything printed off and ready to give away. First off, we handed over her stack of images to have color copied and then the twelve pages of script. "Twenty of each, please". While They were being printed off, we perused the store for the nice binders, etc. that we wanted to use. Our baskets were piling high, and I started to worry that my half of the spending was going to be in the thirty dollar range. Yikes! After our shopping was complete, we headed back to the printing section to retrieve our order and pay for our goods.
While we piled our loot onto the counter, Sister Barss casually asked how much the prints would cost. "Um....the copies come to two hundred dollars." TWO HUNDRED DOLLARS? Was he joking?!!! Who in their right mind would pay for two hundred dollars of copies that were only going to be used as a fancy ding dong ditching present?! We were horrified! Then the hilarity set in and we both started to laugh uncontrollably while we grabbed items off of the counter to return to the shelves. The man must have thought we were loony. We laughed while we paid for our ridiculous amount of paper and the cheapest flimsy binders we could find. We laughed while we drove home. We laughed while we delivered her thoughtful gifts, and we continued to laugh about it for the rest of the month while we pinched our pennies.
To this day it is still the most expensive laugh I have ever had but it was worth every penny of it....especially since my Dad surprised me with some holiday money in the mail a couple days later.
Sister Barss and me at a dinner appointment, shortly before Christmas. The mother of the family that we were eating with gave us these two sweater vests as Christmas presents. Even though it wasn't really my style, I was touched by how kind it was. However, her teenage sons started teasing her with comments like, "Gee, Mom. Did you get a matching one for Grandma, too?" and I couldn't stop laughing. She was a good sport.I got to serve with one of my favorite companions, Sister Barss for the 4 1/2 months leading up to Christmas. Boy was that a treat! There are so many things that I love about her, but her thoughtfulness comes first to mind. Sister Barss was especially excited for Christmas, as she would be returning home just before the holiday and would get to spend it with her family. However, before she left, she wanted to do something special to bring in the true meaning of Christmas to those we loved. She decided that during her morning gospel study, she would compile pictures from past Ensigns and match them with excerpts from the book, Jesus the Christ, to best tell the nativity story. The plan was to separate her findings into twelve installments and give them with a little binder so that people could use it to count down the twelve days of Christmas.
We missionaries had a little over a hundred dollars put into our missionary spending account at the very beginning of each month(mine was paid for by my dad). I knew that I wanted to save some of my December funds to get little presents to send home to family, but I figured that since Sister Barss was going to all sorts of trouble and effort to make this special gift, I could help out with the financing. I told her that I would split the costs with her, figuring that I would be spending around twenty dollars.
All November long she toiled away at her project. I had no doubt that it was going to be lovely. It better have been with all the time she put into it! On the very first preparation day in December, after we got our allowance, we headed off to Office Depot to get everything printed off and ready to give away. First off, we handed over her stack of images to have color copied and then the twelve pages of script. "Twenty of each, please". While They were being printed off, we perused the store for the nice binders, etc. that we wanted to use. Our baskets were piling high, and I started to worry that my half of the spending was going to be in the thirty dollar range. Yikes! After our shopping was complete, we headed back to the printing section to retrieve our order and pay for our goods.
While we piled our loot onto the counter, Sister Barss casually asked how much the prints would cost. "Um....the copies come to two hundred dollars." TWO HUNDRED DOLLARS? Was he joking?!!! Who in their right mind would pay for two hundred dollars of copies that were only going to be used as a fancy ding dong ditching present?! We were horrified! Then the hilarity set in and we both started to laugh uncontrollably while we grabbed items off of the counter to return to the shelves. The man must have thought we were loony. We laughed while we paid for our ridiculous amount of paper and the cheapest flimsy binders we could find. We laughed while we drove home. We laughed while we delivered her thoughtful gifts, and we continued to laugh about it for the rest of the month while we pinched our pennies.
To this day it is still the most expensive laugh I have ever had but it was worth every penny of it....especially since my Dad surprised me with some holiday money in the mail a couple days later.
3 comments:
Ha ha ha!!! I think about you every Christmas and this GREAT gift we gave to everyone! I remember you chuckling "Hey big spender" and then laughing uncontrollably as we put everything together. Good times, happy expensive memories. Sorry I spent all of your money!
You'll have to check my blog starting on Sunday, I'm posting that very same 12 days-with some minor changes-which, happily, will cost me nothing. =o)
Oh...and can I tell you how unattractive that picture is? Scarey!
Hahaha...that is so funny and sad...and sweet. It reminds me of that expensive Easter decoration Mom made copies of for us. :)
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