<p style="text-align:center;"><em>A blog by Chicken Wrangler Sara</em></p>
Twenty-one 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 starting with our daughters first Christmas.<a href="https://judythewriter.files.wordpress.com/2012/12/christmas-1993.jpg"><img class=" wp-image-1885 size-thumbnail alignright" src="https://judythewriter.files.wordpress.com/2012/12/christmas-1993.jpg?w=133" alt="Christmas 1993" width="133" height="150" /></a>

This very same daughter has borrowed this sweater not once but twice to enter in “tacky Christmas sweater” contests. This year she’s loaning it out.

I would be offended except for two years running, my sweater has won.

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.

Today I pulled out my Christmas sweatshirt. It is even older than my tacky sweater.

<a href="https://judythewriter.files.wordpress.com/2012/12/saras-sweatshirt1.jpg"><img class="alignleft size-thumbnail wp-image-1905" src="https://judythewriter.files.wordpress.com/2012/12/saras-sweatshirt1.jpg?w=150" alt="Sara's sweatshirt" width="150" height="84" /></a> <a href="https://judythewriter.files.wordpress.com/2012/12/front-of-sweatshit.jpg"><img class="aligncenter wp-image-1906 size-thumbnail" src="https://judythewriter.files.wordpress.com/2012/12/front-of-sweatshit.jpg?w=150" alt="front of sweatshit" width="150" height="93" /></a>After my first Christmas program (which was several years before our first daughter was born), my students presented it to me. 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.

My mother purchased a Christmas sweater for herself at the same time as she bought my sweater. Definitely fits the ugly sweater category.<a href="https://judythewriter.files.wordpress.com/2012/12/my-sweater.jpg"><img class=" size-thumbnail wp-image-1887 aligncenter" src="https://judythewriter.files.wordpress.com/2012/12/my-sweater.jpg?w=133" alt="O" width="133" height="150" /></a>

But the overall winner of our ugly holiday apparel would be the red sweat suits with appliqued Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer. The suits are long gone, but oh what fun Christmas memories!<a href="https://judythewriter.files.wordpress.com/2012/12/christmassweatshirts.jpg"><img class="aligncenter wp-image-1890 size-medium" src="https://judythewriter.files.wordpress.com/2012/12/christmassweatshirts.jpg?w=160" alt="christmassweatshirts" width="160" height="300" /></a>

YOUR TURN: Do you have an entry for an ugly holiday apparel contest?

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