I need to get something off my chest and this seems like as good a forum as any.

Growing up on Hutchins Street in Saratoga Springs brings back so many fond memories that I don’t have enough space to talk about all of them, but many of the best revolved around the holiday season, especially Christmas.

The DeGrechie family consisted of five main members - Mom, Dad, Lisa, Tami and of course, me.

Lisa and Tami are the identical twins, four years younger than me and at least 10 times cuter. It was never easy being the older brother of two girls in pigtails that dressed the same. Imagine for a moment walking into the local mall - that was Pyramid Mall back in the day - and having your family stopped every few steps because people want to talk to you about the twins. Very few, if any, noticed the brother.

Don’t feel too bad for me readers. I’ve been through years of therapy. Plus, they’re both pregnant and due in several months. It’s not nice to pick on pregnant women. It’s an exciting time in the family, but this column is about Christmas past, so I will get back to growing up DeGrechie.

The night before Christmas, we attended St. Clement’s church on Lake Ave. Most years, this was the kids mass and I’ll never forget the looks on all the young people’s faces throughout that church. There was this mixture of anticipation for the next morning and dread because the mass just wouldn’t end. We were good Catholic kids, so it wasn’t the end of the world that mass dragged on, but there were plenty who just couldn’t handle it as the priest tried to speak over the cries and yells of the depressed.

After church, we would practically glide across the sidewalks on the walk home, which wasn’t very far as we lived around the block.

My mother always prepared a wonderful meal that we of course scarfed down to get to the present portion of the evening’s proceedings.

Soon thereafter while eating our father’s tasty sugar cookies and watching the 1951 version (best one by far) of “A Christmas Carol,” starring Alastair Sim, we would finally get to open a present.

This would make us happy before bed and we would try to convince our parents to let us open another. It usually didn’t work.

Off to bed, but surely not sleep, I would toss and turn for hours because the night before Christmas is hands down the longest night of the year. I also believed it was very important not to open my eyes because Santa would be very upset with me for doing so.

Our bedrooms were located upstairs and the bathroom was downstairs, right near the Christmas tree. If we had to go to the bathroom, our parents would lead us down there blindfolded so we could not check out what had enfolded around the tree in that room.

I guess it’s now time for my confession. Mom and Dad, Lisa and Tami, I may have snuck downstairs a few times in the early morning and rummaged through all the gifts to figure out what Santa had brought me. I was very sneaky about it. On my tippy toes and holding my breath, I would pick up the gifts and shake them before returning to my bedroom.

I feel bad about it, but at least now it’ s off my chest. You may judge me reader, but you probably would’ve done the same thing if you knew how truly exciting a DeGrechie Christmas was and is. Merry Christmas.