Christmas in Trail

This is part of AndreaClaire's Christmas Memory Challenge series.

When I was a kid, my parents didn't like to travel much around Christmas...who could blame them? We lived in Kelowna and pretty much anywhere we would want to go would involve driving in the snow. But when I was 11 and then again when I was 12, they decided we should go to Trail for Christmas.

My grandpa lived in Trail (where my dad grew up) and my aunt and uncle and one year old cousin lived up the hill in Rossland. Christmas in Trail was very different from Christmas in Kelowna.

First of all, it was quiet. Christmas in Kelowna is a multi-day, boisterous affair. The first year in Trail I think there were nine of us. Maybe ten. One toddler. Two in their late 70s/early 80s. The second year there were more because another aunt and her family joined us.

And we had to go to Mass on Christmas Eve. And the Colander restaurant figured prominently. And there was some drugstore Christmas shopping. And lots of snow. And my grandpa was up first. Before all the kids. Armed with his camera. Sitting in an arm chair, facing the stockings, ready to record our faces when we came around the corner.

I think that's my favourite memory of our Christmases in Trail - how excited Grampa got. We only got to spend three Christmases with him (well, I think I spent my first Christmas with him too, but I don't remember it) and it was pretty special for sure!