Show and Tell Tuesday: Best Gift Ever!

Alright y'all, let me just say that I don't know how I am ever going to beat this 'best gift ever' that was given by my mama. 

I mean, unless I can duplicate this EXACT gift... I don't think I can hold a candle to it with my kids. 

Show and Tell Tuesday

Best Gift Ever

So... it begins. I believe this was around 2007. My younger sister (9) and I (11) were currently stuck half time at our bio father's house (he was abusive and we did not wanna be there). And the other half of the time, we got to be with our mama. Which is exactly where we wanted to be!

My mama was spunky, and fun, and so compassionate. She was all about fun. Not caring about the way it looked to anyone else, just about making memories with her kids (she was all about her kids... since forever!). 

My mama was in the middle of fighting this LONG custody battle to get us to live with her full time (which we eventually won about 7 months later! Yay!) 

That being said... we had literally NO money. 

My older brother had come to live in our basement and help mama pay the bills and take care of all of us. We were in desperate times, about to lose our house and I'm sure we had next to no money for food. 

But you know what? She NEVER let us know that. 

So.. onto the story. 

Christmas Eve, we went to bed in our mama's bed and slept all night.. not hearing anything else!

Christmas morning, we woke up to run and see over the bannister (you could see the living room over the bannister from upstairs, which is where the tree was). We looked over and there were no presents. 

We were a little disappointed, but tried not to show it. We turned around to tell our mama that it was okay, we were just happy to be with her that Christmas. 

And just as we turned around, we saw the dining room (you could see it from the stairway going upstairs. Think big open floor plan). 

A TRAMPOLINE. 

Yep. You heard me. 

A trampoline in the dining room. 

My mama felt we needed something fun (we would come home and cry everyday after school because we did not want to leave her), so she had my brother move all of the furniture out of the dining room and build a trampoline. 

She always said that if she could just get us home from school without crying, then we would get on the trampoline and not cry the rest of the night. 

Everyday was so hard for all of us... Just such a struggle. But my mama was so fun and kind hearted. She just wanted us to be happy. So, we'd get on that trampoline and jump for hours. Every night!

I sadly don't have any pictures of this... but I can remember it so clearly! 

A big 16 foot trampoline (with the net around it) in our dining room. It was so big you could hardly open the front door! 

We constantly had friends and neighbors over to jump on the fabled 'trampoline in the living room'! I mean, could it have been any more fun?!

It stayed in our dining room for about 6 months. Until it was warm enough to jump outside. 

That trampoline was money well spent :)

Just to put a name to the face, that's me and my cute spunky mama. We were doing manis and pedis at chemo :)

I hope you enjoyed hearing this! We made the best memories with that trampoline, and I can remember it like it was yesterday!