WE RECALL OUR MOST MEMORABLE GIFTS.

A ring

I've received a lot of great gifts in my life. I was a very lucky kid, and always had plenty of gifts under the tree. We've asked readers to send in stories about the best gift they ever received and I thought I'd share my story too.

When I first started mulling over my best gift my mind initially jumped to childhood, when I got some great gifts. I'll never forget the Christmas when I got a kitten, a grey and white long-haired furball I cleverly named Fuzz. My parents put Fuzz in a box right before gift opening and I just about died with delight when he popped out. Other stand-out childhood gifts included a red scooter and a Peaches 'n Cream Barbie.

My best gift came on Christmas 2001. My boyfriend and I had recently moved to Colorado and I was spending the holidays away from my family and with his family for the first time. As a special gift and a chance for some couple time, he took me to a Tchaikovsky concert at the Colorado Symphony Orchestra. Afterward, we walked a few blocks to a Catholic church downtown and attended mass to celebrate the Epiphany. During mass, as we walked down the aisle to receive communion, I reached my hands back to hold his hands like I always did. Right then, he slipped an engagement ring on my finger! What a tricky devil. I was so surprised and excited. We were married before the next Christmas came around.

I wear the ring every day. Often, when I look at it, I remember the moment I got it and think, ``That was the best Christmas gift ever.''

Annie Hundley

valleynews.com editor

Not the first bike, but the second one

Christmas has always been special to me because of the traditions involved. From the warm feeling I get walking into my mother's kitchen every Dec. 24 morning, to the evening family dinner with all my aunts, uncles and cousins, Christmas is always filled with good times.

And who can forget opening gifts early Christmas morning? As a kid, this was definitely the most cherished of moments.

If I had to decide which gift was the best, I'd have to say the bike my parents gave me. I must have been 7 or 8 years old. It wasn't my first. ... That bike had come about two years earlier from my godfather. But I had long-since wrecked it and was in dire need of a new one.

My parents knew I was a two-wheel maniac and my mother dreaded the day I would eventually get a dirtbike (I've been through a few by now).

Nevertheless, they got me a new bike.

This meant the world to me because I knew they were not happy about the way the old one had died (I had converted a piece of plywood and a couple bricks stacked on top of each other into a ramp and the handlebars had snapped when I came crashing down on the concrete).

Funny thing, I actually found out about my bike on Christmas Eve, which was out of the ordinary because I never saw gifts until Christmas morning. But that evening I had walked into my sisters' room and saw it behind one of the beds.

I knew right away that it was to be mine. I doubt my parents would ever get my sisters a black bike and it was way too small for my older brothers ... that evening it was confirmed that I would be riding a new bike Christmas morning.

Alejandro Guzman

NE and NW San Fernando Valley 

It didn't come in a box

Asked to single out the greatest gift I've ever received, I'm in a bit of a quandary.

The red cowboy boots? The Seiko watch? The hand-lettered picture books? The generous gift certificate to Victoria's Secret from my grownup son, prompted by my remark that after 23 years of buying him underwear it was time to treat Mom?

I've never had a December to Remember that involved an oversized bow on a Lexus or pouted because I was hoping for a Longines. Christmastime around our house is generally a chaotic mix of laughter and surprise, sprinkled with food and friends coming and going. I absolutely love it.

We resist the urge to get a ``decorator'' tree, holding on to the tradition of a live evergreen covered with sentimental baubles illustrating our family's adventures through the years. Cable cars from San Francisco road trips fight for space with three ``Baby's First Christmas'' ornaments, nudging antique glass balls from Czechoslovakia, an oak leaf from Monticello, a plaster Santa holding the leaning tower of Pisa, Canyon Cowboy decorations and primitive bells with cat paw prints embedded in the crackling dough.

Even though it's falling apart, there's always a place in the branches for my baby Santa doll that used to nestle in the flocked branches of parents' tree and the fading cardboard-and-plastic nativity my husband set up on the family's Zenith in their Newhall living room.

So to pick one thing that means more than anything else from my more than a half-century of yuletide celebrations is tough.

I don't think my favorite gift is material. It didn't appear when a ribbon was broken or wrapping paper was shredded. It's almost part of a series, something I've received before and look forward to enjoying year after year.

It's the joy of seeing people enjoy opening a special gift. It's the pleasure-pain groan of friends taking that second portion of pasta or prime rib at our dinner table. It's the laughter of my three kids tumbling through the living room -- the same room they crawled around as babies -- my son throwing one sister over his shoulder, dragging the other attached to his waist as they squirm and tickle themselves out of breath. It's snuggling in the big chair with my sweetheart of 35 years watching White Christmas for the hundreth time and remembering when I first saw those lodge doors swing open to reveal the cinema snow.

I think my favorite gift is the time Christmas gives me to stop my crazy life long enough to appreciate the joy around me. It fills me with hope for the coming year and strength that no matter what the new year throws our way, we'll face it -- together.

Carol Rock

Santa Clarita and Antelope valleys

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Photo:

The valleynews.com team poses around a Daily News' newsroom Christmas tree. In the front row is editor Annie Hundley and community journalist Mark Kellam. In the back, from left, are community journalists Carol Rock, Alejandro Guzman, Jason Kandel and Angie Valencia. Newsroom decorations range from an inflatable tree to menorahs and a skeleton Santa in the sports department.

Edna Trunnell-Simpson/Daily News