A Toddler Christmas- on the Huffington Post

My four-year-old daughter, Elana, is beginning to understand giving and, more importantly to her, receiving. December is a magical month for her, filled with Hanukkah, Christmas, parties and presents. It's a time when Daddy doesn't go to work, and we visit grandparents. Since we live in San Francisco and they live on the east coast, it's also the one time of year we see snow.

I vividly remember the Christmas I was Elana's age. My brother Sam and I lived with our mom in a duplex in a small, depressed, rural Oregon town. Our parents had been somewhat bitterly divorced for a few years, and my mom, who had just earned her certificate at a local college, was a first-year teacher in a very deprived Native American town nearby. Our savings account was empty, and my mom was struggling to get off welfare. My brother and I knew that we had less money than our friends at preschool, and we prepared ourselves not to see much under the tree on Christmas morning.

Read the rest here: A Toddler Christmas