We interrupt our regularly scheduled Chicken Wrangler emails for today’s seasonal email titled
<p align="center"><strong>Don We Now our Gay Apparel</strong></p>
<p style="text-align:left;" align="center"><i>Exactly nineteen years ago, my parents gave me a Christmas sweater. It was something they knew I would never buy for myself but would love. They were absolutely right. I wore that sweater for many years. In fact, I wore it in our Christmas picture for our daughters first Christmas.</i></p>
<img class="aligncenter size-medium wp-image-1885" alt="Christmas 1993" src="http://judythewriter.files.wordpress.com/2012/12/christmas-1993.jpg?w=265" width="265" height="300" />

<i>This very same daughter, nineteen years later, has borrowed this sweater not once but twice to enter in “tacky Christmas sweater” contests. </i>

<i>I would be offended except for two years running, it has won.</i><i>This year, she wasn’t even the one wearing it.</i>

<i> I think I deserve at least some kind of prize for having held on to that sweater long enough for college kids to think it is tacky.</i>

<i>Today was the first really cold day of the season so I pulled out my Christmas sweatshirt. It is even older than my tacky sweater. </i>

<i>I got it from my music class after my first Christmas program (which was several years before our first daughter was born). It has the name of the Christmas musical – “The Town Hall Christmas Tree” – on the front and all the kids’ handprints in red and green on the back and down the arms.</i>

<img class="aligncenter size-medium wp-image-1906" alt="front of sweatshit" src="http://judythewriter.files.wordpress.com/2012/12/front-of-sweatshit.jpg?w=300" width="300" height="186" />

&nbsp;

<img class="aligncenter size-medium wp-image-1886" alt="Sara's sweatshirt" src="http://judythewriter.files.wordpress.com/2012/12/saras-sweatshirt.jpg?w=300" width="300" height="168" />

<i>This morning my son looked at me as I was putting on my shoes over my Christmas socks so I could take him to school and said, “I’m glad you are not getting out of the car.”  </i>

<i>I almost got out and gave him a big hug just for spite. </i>

<i>Later I was at the doctor for my annual check -up and as I stepped on the scale (a frightful thing in and of itself) the nurse said, “What a cute sweatshirt. Are those the handprints of your grandkids.”  </i>

<i>I texted my son later and said “Maybe I should have stayed in the car.”</i>

I laughed and laughed when I received this email from Chicken Wrangler Sara. What fun to remember all the times like she described when she or her teenaged siblings asked me to wait in the car or wouldn't let me out of the house because what I had on didn't suit them. We call her sister Stef the fashion police even today!

I love Christmas and have multiple Christmas sweaters. Depending on the occasion, I select which one to wear. And, like an actress take on different persona depending on which I'm wearing.

For fun, casual parties and gatherings, especially those with sweater contests I wear this one. btw, it was purchased at the same time we bought CW Sara’s in 1993. <span style="color:#444444;line-height:23px;"> </span>

<span style="color:#444444;line-height:23px;"><img class="aligncenter size-medium wp-image-1887" alt="O" src="http://judythewriter.files.wordpress.com/2012/12/my-sweater.jpg?w=266" width="266" height="300" /></span>

For more glitzy affairs when I need bling and swing, I choose this one:

<img class="aligncenter size-medium wp-image-1888" alt="O" src="http://judythewriter.files.wordpress.com/2012/12/bling.jpg?w=212" width="212" height="300" />

And for conservative affairs, my Ralph Lauren angora. With a long skirt or jeans with high boots, I’m styling.

<img class="aligncenter size-medium wp-image-1889" alt="O" src="http://judythewriter.files.wordpress.com/2012/12/angora.jpg?w=208" width="208" height="300" />

But the most fun comes from wearing the homemade variety. My girls will probably kill me for this one, but I loved the year I made us all red sweatsuits with appliqued Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer. The suits are long gone, but oh what fun Christmas memories!

<img class="aligncenter size-large wp-image-1890" alt="christmassweatshirts" src="http://judythewriter.files.wordpress.com/2012/12/christmassweatshirts.jpg?w=546" width="546" height="1024" />

CW Sara has carried on the tradition of creating crafty Christmas garments.

<img class="aligncenter size-medium wp-image-1891" alt="O" src="http://judythewriter.files.wordpress.com/2012/12/2000-teeshirt.jpg?w=287" width="287" height="300" />

We have wreaths with children’s finger and handprints, wall hangings of hand prints/foot prints, and one years she managed to collect ALL eleven grandkids for a handprint Christmas table cloth. Unfortunately, due to the tipping point decision, that tablecloth is packed in storage awaiting our move to Colorado so I can’t show a picture.

YOUR TURN: Do you have any special handcrafted Christmas items?