Like most people, I have been thinking a lot about gifts recently; Christmas gifts and other gifts; gifts of things, deeds and thoughts ... gifts I have received, gifts I have given ... and gifts I have not.

These are some of my family's gift-giving stories.

I first heard the term "unconditional love" when I was thirty-five years old. That's when I learned that not everyone was loved the way I had been...and I was shocked.

Unconditional love was all I knew from my parents and in fact, my entire extended family.

I was disciplined. Boundaries were set. They certainly let me know when I had messed up but it never crossed my mind that I might not be loved just because they were angry with me.

A parent can't give a more important gift and my parents gave this gift in abundance.

Aunt Hazel
The family gift-giving story I love best comes from my Aunt Hazel. There were eleven kids in that family living on a 200-acre farm in the 1920s. Times were tough.

One winter's day, just before Christmas, when she was 7 years-old, Aunt Hazel got to take the five-mile horse and cutter ride into town to do some shopping with her father, just the two of them. They were shopping for those few basic but essential items they couldn't produce on the farm.

As they paid their bill and prepared to leave the store, she couldn't believe what happened --the storekeeper gave her an orange.

She had never actually touched an orange before, none of her siblings had either. The family couldn't afford such luxuries.

When she had climbed back into the cutter to go home and tucked the buffalo robe under her chin, she pulled her arms out of the sleeves of her jacket so she could hold the orange next to her body and every so often slide it up under her collar to smell it.

It was the most exciting gift she had ever received and she couldn't wait to get home ...so she could share it with her ten brothers and sisters.

Now that's a gift.

The best gift I ever received:
The best gift I ever received was a birthday poem from my daughter who was 12 at the time. To this day, my heart swells every time I read it. It's framed and hangs in my office.

The best gift I ever gave:
My Dad always wanted a 22 rifle but never felt he could afford one. In his mind, the family always had greater needs. So he did without until that magic Christmas when my Mother and I chipped in and bought him the best 22 in the store. When Dad saw the parcel under the tree a few weeks before Christmas, we told him it was a gift one of my cousins had bought for his parents and he wanted to store it with us until Christmas morning.

Although Dad loved squeezing and rattling all our gifts to guess what was inside, he never touched that one.

Then on Christmas Eve, when he thought all the presents had been opened, Dad leaned back in his chair as he always did and said, "It's been another great year and another great Christmas."

That's when Mom and I broke the news that he had one more present under the tree.

There are tears in my eyes as I remember the look on my Dad's face when he opened that gift.

The gifts I didn't give?
I didn't hug my parents enough or tell them how much I loved them.

If your parents are still alive that reminder is my Christmas gift to you.