Source: Shower Arguments with Emily Solberg
Most people know that Mom makes the holiday magic.
What they don’t tell you is how.
How does she do it?
What’s her secret?
The truth is—holiday magic comes from the most ordinary, everyday acts of love.
It comes from carefully saving her pennies all year, mentally calculating her budget and how much she has to spend for every person on her list.
It comes from hours spent gently unwrapping each ornament and decoration, and lovingly turning a home into a winter wonderland.
It comes from diligently hunting down the exact make, model, and color of a desired toy, and making sure Grandma and Grandpa and everyone else know what to get, too.
It comes from keeping track of all the special holiday events and obligations—teacher presents, the school Christmas concert, holiday travel plans, what to send in for the class party, pictures at the North Pole.
It comes from making sure each child gets the same number of presents and their own special wrapping paper, and from perfecting the “S” in Santa’s handwriting, and making sure no one sees his wrapping paper before Christmas morning.
But also it comes from checking in on the people she loves. From texting the friend who’s spending Christmas alone for the first time since her divorce, and from organizing a meal train for a cousin who’s stuck in the hospital during the holidays. It comes from ducking out to the store for some flowers and a card for a neighbor who recently lost her husband.
It comes from waiting in the Walgreen’s drive-thru on Christmas Eve to pick up a prescription and sitting in a steamy bathroom with a croupy toddler in the middle of a crisp, cold night.
It comes in spite of her grief—the loss of a beloved family member, or a deep betrayal, or a broken heart.
It comes in addition to everything she already does—the laundry, the meal-planning, the cooking, the appointment scheduling, the driving to and from.
The magic comes . . . not because it’s Christmas.
But because of her.
And it comes from her ordinary, everyday acts of love.
I, Capricious 