Squawk Radio

Sunday, December 25, 2005

ON THE TWELFTH DAY OF CHRISTMAS, THE SQUAWKERS GIVE TO YOU....LAURA T!


Merry Christmas, Squawk Radio~!


I hope everyone is enjoying this magical day. It is a wonderful time to enjoy life, and maybe to do something spectacular for someone you love. Celebrating family and friends is so exciting on Christmas. It always seems to me that there is a special spark in the air. I'll just go ahead and say it.

Christmas is electrifying. Everyone is running around with a spark on their head. From that first magical moment when a child wakes from their imaginative night trying to catch Santa, from the excitement of the parents... the tired parents. All of those lucky women whose fiancés are suddenly down on one knee... The energy is in the air we breathe and there is just no escaping it.
I took my spark this year and sent it off to Leslie's family. Like many posters, and the squawkers here, I had to. I am not sure what the reason was.

I did not even have a choice. My spark flared to life and said, “Send me! Send me!”

I talked about Leslie to my husband almost every day after I heard about her on Squawk Radio from Eloisa. I just had my baby girl, and Leslie just had her baby girl... So, it could have been a mom thing. But I had to do something for her family, and I had no idea what. It was fun to buy all of the stuff on the auctions...but I had to do more.

I am still afraid it is not enough, but my spark could multiply or something. Who knows what happened when I sent it off with the local UPS guy, who is the nicest man in Manlius, NY?

He didn't know I sent my spark. But I am sure Leslie will catch it and see it when she opens the box I sent her this Christmas. There are toys, a baby swing, and dolls...her oldest girl lost her doll collection!

Eeek! So, I sent her off a new one. A small one, but one that will get her started again. I couldn't pass up the cool car for the dolls, and my sister-in-law, the nicest girl from Canandaigua, NY, couldn't let me pass up the My Little Ponies collection for Leslie's second daughter.

Then we found Barnie and Winnie the Pooh ready to keep my spark company in the box full of toys. My sister-in-law and I were so excited at the checkout and I almost cried.

Tim, that's my husband, caught wind of Leslie needing a digital camera. I love that he is an IT guy. So that camera and a few trimmings are in the Mary Poppins type box, too. Anything someone might need from a screwdriver to batteries made its way into the box.

I looooove jewelry, and what spark would travel without it? For Leslie's mom: gold with a teensy weensy pinch of diamond. :O)!

And the find of the season~! Children's books! One of which was made especially for Leslie's girls, I swear, and any child who has gone through the awful hurricane.

Fairy Dust and the Quest for the Egg by Gail Carson Levine. It is a great adventure with a hurricane theme throughout the whole book. It's enchanting and wonderful. And I hope it will make the Ferdinand girls feel as special as they are for everything they have been through.

I hope all of our sparks and well wishes and packages and cookies and decorations and cards and gift cards and seriously generous auction donations from all of the people here on Squawk Radio create some fire works for Leslie, and on Christmas Day.....

They might just weave enough magic for us all.
[For anyone who wasn't around the blog when Katrina hit New Orleans, the Squawk community adopted a romance writer, Leslie Ferdinand. We all helped Leslie get back on her feet, sending her books and towels and toys for her three children. We bid on terrific romances on e-bay, and sent her the money to buy a couch and a computer. But the Squawkers felt that Laura T. really exemplified the spirit of Christmas, because Laura decided to make her family's presents this year, and spend her Christmas budget giving Leslie and her babies the Christmas they couldn't have without Laura's help. We don't need to end this blog by saying God Bless Us Every One -- I think we all know that Laura is blessed already.]
Eloisa James, 8:43 AM
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