You’ve Never Seen a Christmas Like This

Is there a captcha on it?

No.

You want to carry this, Lily?

Merry Christmas, Lily. Merry Christmas, Luchador. Mucho scraps for him this morning.

What do you call a hot dog on a rock?

I don't know, I give up.

Hot dogs.

Let's see if we can see them under there. Oh, they're out. You're out from your nest. Look how used they are to me now. Like, this one didn't even jump. You guys got them down here? Good deal. Okay, did we get Flossie her alfalfa? You're like a couple days overdue. You gonna give us a baby today? We gonna have a Christmas baby? No fresh mucus, no crazy swelling. Her udders, they're still not crazy tight. I don't know if they did get crazy tight though. Did they get crazy tight last time?

They got crazy tight as soon as the calf was born.

Yeah. Hey, Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas!

I see you got your working outfit on.

I do, and I got my bathing suit too.

Oh!

So we've decided to stay in shape and to prep for the Polar Plunge, we should do a family workout. Which this morning is going to be hauling wood from across the street.

Boom. Boom.

You're gonna do that with us too?

Are you, Mama?

Yeah.

Thank you guys for helping with this. I'm gonna go throw the hay and then we'll come back and do the family workout.

Is it cold outside?

Oh yeah.

What does that mean?

I thought it wasn't supposed to be that cold.

Put your clothes on, Mr. Brown. Let's go throw hay. Uh, where are your boots? I can't make this up. Oh, there they are. That ended well. Come on. Get your shoes on, let's go. Go, Jonah, go warm up Sally, please. Grab that cane and put it where it goes, please. Yesterday our Energizer batteries were dead. We plugged one during the day, got half full, we went and, uh, put it out. We plugged this all night. Jonah says it's not charged, but it's showing green light. Test it with this. What the heck? Huh, he was right, it's not charged. Okay, I've started it over. I don't know, maybe it wasn't set up right because yesterday it worked. We're gonna have to leave that charging and hopefully this half-full battery out here— the one, it's designed for two batteries— hopefully this one battery will hold out. This is as far as we go with Sally. It's too wet and muddy. All right, let's get our pre-workout on. You don't, you don't value the workout? It's hard to sell them on that. Y'all push it, please.

Get in.

You show the camera when I'm— get up there, okay? I got one hay bale up there. I don't know about you, Josiah, but I'm mega warmed up. I have to haul it way up there where the cows are by hand. I'm trying not to look at it as like a chore. That is a workout. Here we go. This wood needs to be under the shed, out of the weather. I tried running again for a little bit of a workout, but then I'm like, why not get some work done for an aerobic workout? Watch out, Gideon. All right, look what we did in 30 minutes, guys. We worked out, we hauled wood, we hung out together as a family. That's a win-win. And they're about to have some fun. We're gonna get one Henry load of already dry firewood for immediate use. Uh, hey Beck, you want to pull this up, get warmed up? You feel like you've got warmed up for the plunge?

Yeah, it's the sun coming up, that's a game changer tremendously.

You still gonna do it?

Are we gonna take that up?

I'm all your head under. We could. That's Kenlan.

Yeah, I know.

Jonah, can you drag that one?

I'm helping.

Here, I'll drag it, you spot me. You sweating yet?

I would put it right there.

See that umbrella and those jars? Yeah, let's clear it. All right, Rebecca says she's still gonna polar plunge. Oh man, I don't think she knows what she's getting into. It's uncomfortable until you get out, then it feels great. But who's not doing it? I don't think Lily and Gideon aren't doing it. Christmas Day polar plunge. You gonna do it? Head too?

I'm trying.

Are you gonna go in slow or are you gonna just jump in?

I'm gonna try to just jump in. I'm trying to do this because I want mind over matter. Yeah, seek discomfort.

There you go.

And, and get over like these hard things.

I like it.

So that's—

now I don't sound so crazy.

Now that's what this is about for me, is doing something that's really hard.

Who's ready?

Yeah!

Polar plunging as a family, or polar plunging period, on Christmas Day always works better with a camera.

He's hanging out.

I'm going to go for a minute. Oh my gosh, you just got to do it. Just in, in, in and out.

Hold on, my feet—

don't hang out. My feet hurt so bad. You got to not even let your feet hurt.

You just got to run in. Run in, jump.

See, I have Hashimoto's and that makes me extra cold.

Yeah, that's it.

Oh, my legs, like, it was like burning. All right, hold on, hold on.

Okay, Gideon's going for All right.

Okay, hold on.

Get in, Mama, get in!

Oh yeah!

Oh my God, oh my God, you did it, you did it!

Get her a towel, get her a towel! Get her a towel! Here, you did it!

I'm like dizzy. I don't know if that's normal.

Oh my God, my legs!

Here, I need like a wetsuit to do— You need a wetsuit?

That's a side department. Here, give me the— give me a towel for your mom. Lily, you're on a towel.

Here we go.

My feet are like burning.

That's normal.

Oh my gosh.

Here.

Oh my gosh. Oh, it hurts so bad. Is that normal for my feet?

Oh, absolutely. My feet are burning.

My feet are on fire.

Oh my gosh. I did not— I did not do the—

That's the hard part.

You want to try again? No, I like this look. Winter boots and swimsuits.

I cannot express how bad my feet hurt right now. It hurts so bad.

You got chill bumps all over.

I'm gonna get me some wet—

I do too, Rebecca.

I'm gonna get me some wet— because I think I could do it if my feet didn't hurt this bad. Okay, I'm gonna get me a wetsuit booty.

You haven't given up then?

No, but I just can't. I think I have bad circulation in my feet.

Papa, you guys have to carry everything out, or it's freezing.

You guys packing the boxes for the aunts?

We are. So that's Aunt Fella.

I like it.

And this is gonna be ours.

Let's see what it looks like.

All right, when I was a child, my dad, my late father, used to have us go around Christmas Day. We wanted to play with our presents. We had to go around on Christmas Day and visit the aunts. Last year we started that tradition again with him.

Well, this is supposed to remind you of Hooper Street Church.

Yeah, when they gave a bag. Yeah, bag of goodies.

Thankfully we did that with him. We had no idea it was going to be his last Christmas.

So Aunt Number One, Aunt Nellie, her husband had heart surgery this year, like last week, I guess.

He's doing good.

He's doing fine. He's just here recuperating.

These Western North Carolina old-timers are tough. Well, it would help if we remembered the goodies. We got to bring them goodies. There we go. Just put it down on the—

I'll put it over here.

Thanks. Well, we got to see Uncle Cotty. He's doing good. Did not get to see my aunt. No, she's— I guess she wasn't here. She wasn't here, so we missed her. And we gave him the candies.

He'll probably enjoy that.

I think so. He was in good spirits.

He looked really good too for having the procedure. He'll be out Friday, so today's Wednesday. So just 2 more days, which will be nice for him.

All right, stop number 2. Aunt Phyllis, the lady we named our cow after. Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas! Oh my goodness, we brought you— oh, come right in.

This is, uh, Papaw's sister, y'all.

You're good.

We got some cookies and some candy for you.

Oh my, thank you, thank you, thank you! Oh, that's great. Don't you like hugs?

I like hugs.

I like hugs a whole lot better than handshakes. So yeah, I believe that'll go. I don't know what—

I hope you're happy.

He's ready.

I don't even know what that is. You have to open it up and see.

It would definitely hand it to her. Yeah, here you go, Lily. Mickey Minnie Mouse.

I've thought about all you children a lot and prayed since he passed. And a lot, a lot of memories in Burl Holler. We grew popcorn and, and then take it in the house and pop it in that wooden stove. I mean, in the— on top of the wooden stove, pop the popcorn. And we did peanuts the same way. I don't know if we— we didn't do that all the time, but I remember the times that we did that. And you grew peanuts, and then you covered them, covered the blooms, and then the peanut grew. Have you grew any peanuts?

I've not done peanuts.

Okay, you cover the, the bloom, I think, is what we did, and then the peanut would be underground, and you dug them out, kind of. And then we took the peanuts and put them in the oven and roasted them and had roasted peanuts.

Nice.

So that was great when we could, we could do that.

Bye-bye, we love you.

Bye-bye, I love you too.

I love all of you. Yeah, yeah, Merry Christmas, Merry Christmas, Happy New Year.

You guys come back and see me another time.

Oh, we will.

Back home from the aunts. Mr. Brown is seriously getting on flip-flops. Well, it's seriously that warm out here. It's probably 50. Okay, first things first, let's get this net up from way up here. Let's load Sally and bring it down to the cows. Wait, let me get out of the line. Okay, I think if I hold it like that it'll do better. Oh my, we got a side-by-side full of gear. On to setting it up. Okay, we got to get down. We're going to have to go down and around. It's too muddy over there in our lane. What are you doing? And then back up somehow. I was driving by something really special. I want you guys to see something. I want you to look in there. You see how green that grass is? Okay, normal color grass in the winter. Blood-fed grass. That's where we kill the pig, and that's where it bled out. Look at that. Two pigs there. That's just amazing. I'm certain we can get through here. It's here, but it's a little— it's a little too like this, wet. Yay! The sheep are right there. We're gonna move them up. We open this up to the cows. They're not out here yet, they're over by the water. Let's get the new sheep fence up and move them up. You like Sally's eyelashes? You like Sally's kissy lips? A viewer sent us that. Got the cows some hay. Actually, they don't care about the hay. They found the new grass. I guess we're not getting a Christmas baby from Flossie. Every day goes by, bigger chance of having a baby from Aunt Flossie. Sheep, sheep, sheep, sheep! We're gonna move them, but I want to give them a little bit of hay while they're maybe hungry. Look at you guys coming right up to me. Come on, we want you in there. Come on around, go around, go up above Stud Muffin and come down. You know, come on, come on, there you go, come on, there we go. Good mama. Grandma called us over for a ride before we get done. Everybody, you want a ride?

Yeah.

Where do you want to go?

Ah, anywhere you want to take me.

How do you like Sally's eyelashes? Those are so cute. Here's our view, Grandma.

We're up high. I'm glad we didn't have to walk up here.

How was it, Grandma?

Wonderful fun. Oh, it's a wonderful addition to the farm, right?

For sure. All right, we're back. Hey baby, look who's here. Hey Ginger.

Hey, hey, hey, hey, how are you?

Yes, good, good. Oh my biscuits, what's under there?

Green beans, green beans, collards.

Almond bread, cornbread.

That's regular. That's actually cornbread for my dad, um, but it's corn. The kids can have it. I just— I'm not gonna eat it.

Wow.

Corn. And then we've got the potatoes, twice baked potatoes casserole. It's been almost a year.

Oh my.

And then we got—

yeah, it's been a year.

Lazed ham, our own ham. Yes, it's gonna be delicious. You're gonna, you're gonna cut it up. I need to get to it.

How is it, everybody?

Good.

It's wonderful.

It's good. And we just remembered Rebecca's got to milk the cow tomorrow, so my life's gonna be a hair easier. Little Christmas gift from Grandma to the kids. Great Christmas gift.

You'll not be volunteering me, no sirree, said the scared rabbit. Is he watching me?

Is he?

Howdy Dee Dee, it is me, the Chickadee Dee Dee. I will go, I will take the lead.

Use 3, 2, 1, 2, 3, 3, 3. Use your third finger.

Right.

3, 2, thumb, 1, 2. Right, see your right. 3, 2, 1, 2, 3, 3, 3. 2, 2, 2, 3, 3, 3. Right, you keep working on that.