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When the first of December arrived, Tommy was not ready, but he was excited.

He’d never been good at the holiday thing.

As a kid he loved them, the Christmas lights and decorations and the baking and the holiday cheer. His mum and dad always made the holidays special, but after they died he was rarely with a foster home long enough to actually appreciate the feeling of family associated with Christmas time and the end of the year, so he didn’t really understand the excitement that came with the season.

But it was different when it came to the Minecraft family.

When Tommy first came to live with them he was a nervous one-legged kid with too much anxiety and constantly running on too little sleep. He mucked up the morning of and dropped the batter for the sugar cookies, which smashed across the ground and was deemed inedible the moment it touched due to the bare feet and pink hairs that Techno had been shedding all morning during his efforts to learn how to braid.

The moment the batter hit the ground Tommy panicked and started having an anxiety attack, only for a hand on his shoulder and a soft smile from Phil to ease all of his anxiety before it could really fester and turn into something worse.

His first Christmas with the Minecraft’s had been a bit of a disaster.

His next was a little better. Tommy had gotten Henry a few months before and most of the gifts from his foster family were dog-centered, including a particularly thoughtful gift from Techno of a pink pig plush that Henry immediately adored.

This third year felt different, in a good way. It felt like everything was finally fitting together right.

Tommy felt at home, with Phil and Techno and Wilbur and Tubbo and Henry and Ranboo.

The failed sugar cookies on his first Christmas with the Minecraft’s was a repeat adventure, though they were only marginally successful on later attempts.

There were however some changes to what everyone's tasks were over time, affectionately dubbed the “No You Can’t Do That to Sugar Cookies List.”

Tommy was not allowed to hold the bowl of dough, due to his first Christmas and dropping it. Techno was not allowed to do his hair in the kitchen, or use the electric mixing bowl (another hair-related incident). Wilbur was not allowed to go near the oven or be in charge of picking ingredients, the Incident of Tommy’s Second Christmas came to mind, when Wilbur used lard instead of butter in all of the cookies, resulting in inedible cookies that looked beautiful.

Only Phil was allowed to mix the ingredients and go near the oven, though his second task was on thin ice from when he forgot the oven gloves and grabbed a hot tray bare handed. The words said that morning by one Phil Minecraft will not be repeated, but the laughter of that morning is a constantly re-lived memory.

When Tubbo joined the family, he got the honor of being in charge of the sprinkles. This lasted all of three minutes before he proceeded to dump the entire thing of perennials onto the carpeted living room floor.

Why did he have the sprinkles in the living room? 

No one knows.

The ranks of the Minecraft family and their banned tasks was finalized with the addition of Ranboo on Tommy’s fourth Christmas with the family.

They were invited at the last minute, due to miscommunication, but he came over on Christmas Eve for movie watching in pajamas and woke to the chaos of the annual sugar cookie baking day.

Ranboo’s addition to the cookie making ranks was successful at first. He appeared to have a good grasp on mixing, shaping, and baking.

And then came the Frosting Incident.

A loose grip on the electric hand mixer and a missing Phil led to the worst incident in the Minecraft Household .

And the best laughter.

Ranboo’s lax grip on the bowl of icing as they mixed it led to it slipping while the electric hand mixer was spinning. The surprise of the bowl slipping from his hand led to him not letting go of the “on” button on the mixer, which led to icing being flung everywhere .

The sound of the bowl hitting the ground startled Wilbur, who was in the process of spreading the already made icing onto the cookies. He practically threw his cookie in surprise.

His cookie hit the edge of Techno’s paper plate and sent a massive heap of sprinkles into the air just as Tommy was crossing the kitchen. All of the sprinkles ended up under Tommy’s feet, more specifically his prosthetic feet, and sent him falling to the ground and pulling Tubbo down with him.

The horror of the entire incident lasted for all of five seconds, before rambunctious laughter broke out. Ranboo attempted to stutter out apologies through his laughter but no one cared.

And when Phil returned, he was greeted with all of his kids in various states of crying from laughter and a new mess to clean up.