Not what you'd think but here:

I was an only child living with a single mom...always just the 2 of us. One xmas funds were particularly tight. We got up to a cold xmas morning and decided to make a fire in the fireplace, which we didn't know how to do. We'd lived there a month or so, and had never had a fireplace before. The whole front room, with the tree, filled with smoke.

We sat on the floor, under the smoke, with some hot chocolate and opened presents. Two each.

Then we got cleaned up and went next door, where we'd been invited to a potluck/buffet breakfast and present opening at the neighbors. They were a couple with a toddler and a large extended family.

The breakfast was great, the people friendly. There were too many people to get to know all of them, or have any significant interaction; too many to watch everyone open gifts; crowds were opening stuff all at the same time. When we sat down to watch the gift opening, the family room was so full of presents that nobody could actually fit in there; someone had to go in, collect presents, and pass them out in the other room we were in. There were hundreds of presents. We watched that toddler open about 10 of them, and noticed that the adults were more excited than he was; he seemed kind of confused, because every time he got a present open, someone would take it away and hand him another. He never got to play with anything. After 30 minutes or so, he was getting tired and cranky, but they didn't let him stop until every last gift was opened; enough to fill a play room, but he hadn't been given the opportunity to explore any of them. Then he went down for his nap, and they put his new stuff "away" for the rest of the day that company would be there.

I went home thinking that my mom, our smoky house, and my 2 presents were pretty special.