This Christmas Heirloom Is The Greatest Gift I’ll Ever Give

If Santa Claus knows if you’ve been bad or good, he must not have been keeping a very watchful eye on a little house in the Lansbrook neighborhood of Oklahoma City in the 1970s. Inside, my dad and his three brothers were doing their best to test the limits of the nice list every day of December. There were tantrums, bouts of roughhousing, and even the unimaginable—voluntary early-morning alarms—all in the name of one goal: Each boy wanted to be the one who got to hang the ornament on the Akin family Advent calendar. 

To this day, it is one of our most beloved and storied heirlooms. It was created in 1971 by my grandmother Sally Akin, better known as Big Mama. Compared to some of the more intricate projects from later in her life, it’s a bit plain. She sewed 24 petite pockets onto a slender piece of canary yellow cotton, glued on a felt tree adorned with buttons, punched out letters spelling “Merry Christmas” in gingham fabric, and hand sewed 24 ornaments in the shapes of various dubiously Christmas-related items. The breakable baubles were embellished with petite beads and sequins and stuffed with dryer lint—Big Mama was notoriously frugal. Starting on the first of December, a lucky person affixed one ornament per day to the tree. By Christmas Eve, things like an angel, a drum, a giraffe, and something that could either be a duck or a goose hung side by side. 

The Legacy Maker

This decoration was not a one-off; Big Mama was a creator in her soul. She was a practiced home cook, the author of the silliest rhyming poems, and a do-it-yourselfer before it was cold. But most of all, she was a prolific sewer. The recipient of the August 1992 Golden Thimble award from The Daily Oklahoman, she was known throughout Northwest Oklahoma City for her ability to make just about anything. Recycled-denim quilts, bridesmaid dresses, period-accurate Union soldier Halloween costumes, youth-basketball warm-up jackets—if she could dream it up, she was capable of producing it. She gave away her work easily and often; you would have a demanding time finding someone she knew who doesn’t have some cherished artifact that she crafted for them.

In the early 1990s, when her first grandchildren were born, she made recent and improved Advent calendars for the families of my dad and his older brother. And she did it again in the mid-2000s, when my younger cousins entered the picture. My brother, Jake, and I inherited the tradition of squabbling over turns—though frequently we were both beaten to the punch by my dad, who never outgrew the magic of putting each piece in its place.

Robbie Caponetto

Love That Echoes

On December 23, 2011, Big Mama was diagnosed with lymphoma, and a few days later, we celebrated our last Christmas with her. We all have spent the 4,500-some days since she died missing her. She was a petite lady (just 5-foot-2), but she filled any room she was in with her noisy Oklahoma twang, her boisterous personality, and her generous spirit. And she still looms immense—in quilted seasonal table runners; holiday-themed pillowcases with names embroidered on them; matching Akin-cousin pajamas we’ve outgrown but held onto; and, most of all, in our memories of the true unconditionality of her love. 

Katie Akin

Carrying On The Tradition

When my brother and sister-in-law told us in overdue 2022 that they were expecting the first child of a recent generation of Akins, my mom and I mourned Big Mama all over again. My nephew, Oliver, would miss out on so many of the wonderful things she would have whipped up for him. None of her sons had picked up her crafting skills, and I found myself interested in handiwork too overdue to learn from her. But Sally Akin wouldn’t have wanted us to waste time being depressed and sitting on our hands. She would have given us some felt she had lying around and said, “It’s not that hard!”  

So my mom and I decided, with no pattern, no guide, and no expertise, to make our best approximation of an invaluable heirloom. We took many trips to crafts stores, had several fraught phone calls about the best millimeter size for rickrack, and enlisted the facilitate of a seasoned sewer friend when we found ourselves in over our heads. I switched out a few ornaments for things I thought my brother’s family would enjoy, like re-creations of their two dogs, but otherwise, we stayed true to Big Mama’s vision. She never got to meet Oliver, but I know she gave all of us extra love while she was here to pass on to him. I hope that, for years to come, when his growing hands slip the ornaments over the red buttons, he can feel her warmth radiating out of our homespun tribute.