Monogramed Christmas Stockings from Neiman Marcus

I'm Jewish.  But I spent most of my childhood in a Catholic neighborhood, jonesing a Christmas tree, which my father adamantly refused to provide.  (The "Chanukah Bush" was a nice gesture, dad, but really didn't cut it.)  As a teen-ager, I reveled in my friends' family Christmas celebrations, and adopted the holiday as my own when I shared an apartment in New Haven with my Protestant pal Bill Dodge.  Ironically, I celebrate it now with my siblings, step-mother Chris and my Dad, who, in marrying the second time out of the faith, brought Christmas home.  Yay!  My favorite part is the filling and emptying of the stockings, which thanks to my friend Tracey's family I embraced fully, with my own special stocking,  monogrammed by me with glue and glitter.  If you're not feeling so crafty, you can let Neiman Marcus do the work for you, and order one of these needlepoint-monogrammed stockings.  The remaining Angel and Bear motifs are on sale for $38.