I’ve shared this holiday tale before, but I simply had to tell it again! After all, it’s the one story my mom recounts every Christmas, without fail.
It's not about Santa or a reindeer named Rudolph. No, this is about a miracle that occurred in the middle of our family room back in 1984…
It was a couple days before Christmas and I was one-and-a-half years old. My sisters had just gone to bed–visions of sugarplums no doubt dancing in their heads!
But I was still awake and sitting in my mom’s lap. My dad plopped down next to the Christmas tree, rearranging all the pretty presents before Santa’s big arrival.
“And what do you want from Santa this year?” he asked my mom.
She didn’t have to think long about her answer. You see, I’d been born with a dislocated hip and, for nearly a year, I had to wear a cast that went from my waist to my knees.
The cast had come off in October, but I still hadn’t taken those first steps. And my parents were getting nervous.
“I just want Diana to walk,” my mom said.
Well, not one to disappoint, I got up from my mom’s lap and walked over to my dad. My parents couldn’t believe it–they started crying and laughing. Confused, I started crying too!
“It was a true miracle,” my mom said later. “My happiest Christmas.”
Of course, I don’t remember any of this. But growing up, just the idea that something so miraculous could happen always filled me with wonder and awe.
If God cared so much about my first steps, I could only imagine what he had in store when it came to the bigger steps in life too.
What about you…do you have a simply unforgettable holiday memory? Get in on the conversation and share your story below.
By the way, that's me in the photo, on the left–around age 3–trimming the tree with my sister Kristin!
