"Come on Sam, let's wake Mommy, Santa came!" were the words she heard that awakened her from her short slumber.

"I'm coming, sweetheart," she said as she crawled out of bed and put a house coat on.

The clock read 5:15 a.m. She had just gotten to bed a couple of hours before. It seemed playing Santa took a little longer now that she was a single parent.

"Wake up sleepy head," she said, hugging her sandy blonde curly headed one named Sam, who just turned 12. "Don't think your sister is going to let us sleep."

She and same slowly moved down the stairs.

"Come on, come on!" her excited younger daughter shouted by the tree that was surrounded by unopened presents and an endless sea of boxed up toys.

She slowly found her place in the chair next to the tree that was once occupied by her ex-husband.

She watched as Sam slowly took his place by his sister on the floor.

"You know the rule, stockings first," she instructed her kids.

Sam rolled his eyes. He knew what they contained. Candy, fruit, a small toy or CD. Socks and underwear ...

Clara tore into hers. She pulled out fuzzy pink socks, a small bag of panties and a Taylor Swift CD.

"Taylor Swift, Taylor Swift, yes ... yes! Thank you Santa!" the 5-year-old shouted.

Her mother smiled a tired smile. Sam again rolled his eyes.

"Your turn, sweetie," she said to her oldest.

Sam pulled out the candy and the apple. He pulled out what he thought at first was a video game.

He smiled and gave her a strange look.

It was a CD ... a Katy Perry CD.

"You don't think I know that you like Katy Perry," she said with a laugh. "I've heard you sing Roar in the shower enough to know."

Sam hugged his mother. Then he reached in a pulled out another surprise ... instead of the usual briefs, he pulled out a pack of bikini panties.

"Sam's got girls panties," Clara giggled.

"They are Sam's panties," her mother corrected her daughter.

Sam pulled out a pair of pink fuzzy socks that matched Clara's. Then he pulled out three training bras.

"You'll have to try them on to see if they fit," she said. "I guessed at your size. I hope they fit."

"Sam's got bras?" Clara asked.

"Girl's Sam's age aren't supposed to let people see their boobies," she said. "That's why SHE needs them."

She. The first time she referred to her son as a female.

"What will dad say?" Sam asked.

"What can he say?" she replied. "He can't bother you anymore. I want you to be who you are."

Who Sam was had been a question both she and her child had been asking since the first time she caught him in her clothes when he was younger than Clara was now.

Her ex accused her of trying to make Sam into a sissy. But she tried to back his efforts to toughen Sam up. Sam gave it his all, she thought, but his father couldn't make him into something he wasn't.

Sam cried. She hugged her child. Clara did, too.

"If you want to be a girl, I'm here for you every step of the way," she told her child.

"I am a girl, Mom," Sam whispered.

"Clara didn't know she was getting a sister for Christmas," their mother said.

She watched as Sam's mannerisms changed with each gift, from a Kindle Fire and an ipod, to a pair of skinny jeans and a camisole. There seemed to be sparkle in the eye of the child whose biggest Christmas gift was the gift to be herself.

She helped her sister rip into a Barbie playhouse and played Barbies with her little sister, a priviledge that once came with a whipping from a disproving father.

"Can I put this on?" Sam asked her mother of the flannel night gown that matched her sister's.

Her mother nodded her head approvingly. She watched Sam dart upstairs with the nightgown, pack of panties and a bra.

Sam surprised her mother and younger sister with how she looked when she came back down the stairs.

She put on a matching headband she found on her mother's dresser.

"She's really pretty Mommy," Clara said.

"Yes, she is," their mother replied.

Her two children went back to opening gifts. Sam opened a small verticle box and was pleasantly surprised by its contents.

It was a pair of pink ballet shoes.

"I know you begged me a couple of years ago to take ballet lessons, but your dad said no," read the note. "If you want to take classes at Clara's school, you can. I talked with the teachers."

It beat the pair of cleats Sam used to get, although Sam didn't entirely dislike sports.

Their mother passed a couple of matching boxes to Clara and Sam and asked them to open them at the same time.

Inside the boxes were matching dresses, socks and shoes.

"I want my girls to wear them today when they come to my house," read a note. "I want my Samantha to know that I am on her side and want her to feel beautiful."

"We'll wear them!" Sam said.

Her mother pondered her eldest child's journey to come.

She knew there would be some hard days, and some with heartbreak.

But not on this magical Christmas day.