The Sun Journal asked readers and staffers to share some of their favorite Christmas memories. We’ll run them over four more days. Today: Sleigh bells ring, snowball fights, family time and a gift from the grave.

Christmas from beyond

“For many years, my legally blind Aunt Priscilla Karkos of Dover, N.H., would always send my grandmother and me a Christmas tree ornament she knitted, crocheted, embroidered or otherwise made by hand. It would always be placed on a handmade Christmas card and would arrive in the mail a few days before Christmas. My aunt was beset with a variety of health problems, but she still managed to tat 100 Christmas ornaments every year and mail them to friends and family.

Then, when I got married in 1999, Aunt Priscilla added my wife and me to her list. It was such a treasure to get these unique gifts from her that they really made our Christmases delightful. She also began corresponding with my wife, which really brightened her life.

Alas, Aunt Priscilla passed away on Sept. 18 this year at the age of 89. We were heartbroken.

So, imagine my surprise when I got the mail Dec. 20 on the way to work and found a small envelope to us from Aunt Priscilla! My thumb and fingers felt some kind of craft inside the envelope as I stared at it in shock. Sure enough, opening it at my work desk, there was the handmade card with the perfect silver rectangle encasing her handwritten ‘Merry Christmas from Priscilla’ in red ink, inside which were two tatted holly leaves and three tatted red berries. She’d included a typed greeting: ‘May your Christmas be as happy as I was while making this tatted holly leaf. I hope everyone has a happy, healthy New Year.’

There was also a note from her son and their family: ‘She spent her last few months making sure her Christmas cards would be ready for all that she loved and cared for.’

God bless you, Aunt Priscilla, for brightening our Christmas from beyond the grave. I can’t wait to tell my wife.”

Terry Karkos, SJ staff writer

Special delivery

“It was Christmas Eve 1936 and we were all around the round oak stove. At about 9 p.m. in the evening my father, Charles Gustin, a longtime mail carrier in Sabattus, exclaimed, ‘Oh, hell!’ He got up out of his chair and began putting on his heavy socks, boots and other outer clothing, including a large stocking cap.

It seems as though Mrs. B had walked the half-mile out to the Bog Road every day that week to check if the mailman had brought a package from Sears, a gift for her son, but every day, no gift. The mail came to the post office twice a day; the morning mail was delivered that day and the afternoon mail was held over till the next day. This Sears package had come in the afternoon mail, so it was to be delivered the next day. Well, the next day was Christmas, so NO deliveries would be made. Mrs. B was heartbroken, as there would be no present for her son on Christmas.

My father went to the barn and harnessed his horse, a pacer, to the sleigh and started for the post office in Sabattus, as he held the key to the post office to use for late delivery when the postmaster was out. I do not know when my father got back but I remember sleigh bells that night. Mrs. B was very happy to get that gift for Christmas.”

George Gustin, Wales

Dashing through the snow

“I don’t remember the year, but it was in the late 1960s. My parents and my three siblings (we were between the ages of 7 and 13) had visited my aunt, uncle and cousins on Jan Boulevard in Lewiston as we did every Christmas Eve. That particular eve there was a snowstorm, and as we headed home to Pleasant Street, not long after we turned onto Webster Street, our car got stuck in a snowdrift!

Cellphones were a thing of the future, and there was no way my parents were going to bother our relatives at that hour, so we had no option but to walk home — at 11 p.m. — in pitch darkness, on Christmas Eve, with snow up to our knees! At that time Mitchell Street was thick with woods, ‘Paradise Park’ (for those of us who remember that great park) being the only thing there and even that was off in the woods. What a wonderful time we all remember having trudging through the snow, throwing snowballs at each other and at our parents and just having the best Christmas Eve ever! We all look back on that night as our best Christmas memory.”

Nancy Cyr, Lewiston

Family Christmas

“I have one brother and three sisters and our family has now grown to 36, which includes parents, children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren. It has become tradition that we have our family Christmas the first Saturday of January which is the time that we can all be together. The one that was very special was the one on Jan. 9, 2010. On that day, we celebrated Christmas at a nursing home where our dad had been living for a year. When he saw all of us there, he was so happy and had a smile from ear to ear. Seeing him so happy to be with family was special to us because being with family meant the world to him and our Mom. Little did we know that on Jan. 27, 2010, our father would pass away.

When we now have Christmas every year, it means even more knowing he is watching over all of us. Our mom will be 95 on Jan. 17, 2012, and she cherishes every Christmas with her family. We will continue this tradition again on Jan. 7 and will make it special, as always.”

Leo Baillargeon, SJ graphic designer in advertising