#or peter and martha (the other cratchit children)

[piglinmyfeet]

Jimmy being a ghost is so currently relevant

It's just like A Christmas Carol, but is Jimmy the ghost of Christmas past present or future?

[weltato]

Rating: General Audiences Warnings: None Category: Gen

Relationships: Bob Cratchit/Mrs. Cratchit, Bob Cratchit/Emily Cratchit (VHS Christmas Carols), Tim Cratchit & Ebenezer Scrooge, Tim Cratchit & The Little Match Girl (VHS Christmas Carols), Bob Cratchit & Ebenezer Scrooge, Mrs. Cratchit & Ebenezer Scrooge, Ebenezer Scrooge & Emily Cratchit (VHS Christmas Carols), Cratchit Family & Ebenezer Scrooge, Cratchit Family & The Little Match Girl (VHS Christmas Carols)

Characters: Bob Cratchit, Mrs. Cratchit (A Christmas Carol), Emily Cratchit (VHS Christmas Carols), Bob Cratchit and Mrs. Cratchit's Children, Tim Cratchit, Martha Cratchit, Belinda Cratchit, Peter Cratchit, Cratchit Family (A Christmas Carol), The Little Match Girl (VHS Christmas Carols), Ebenezer Scrooge

Additional Tags: i know the other two kids are called mary and john but uhh, they're not anymore we've got different names in this, mary and john don't exist here sorry, Fluff, Domestic Fluff, Family Fluff, Family, Family Dynamics, scrooge is the cratchit kids uncle, but he's eleanora's grandad kinda, she just calls him the nickname without the uncle on top, Short, Short One Shot, Short & Sweet, Song Lyrics, fred jim and della get mentioned

Chapters: 1/1 Words: 964

Series: Part 11 of 'The 12 Fics of The Holidays (2023)'

Summary: Just the Cratchits being a family, featuring Scrooge and The Little Match Girl.

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HUGE thank you to @jewishruthfleming for telling me the names of the Cratchit kids <3 I could put names to face and that really helped :)

I've got one more to go! Then my holiday fics are done for another year (hopefully I'll stick within December next time ^^;;)

[princesssarisa]

Character ask: the crachit family excluding Bob and tiny tim from a Christmas carol

Favorite thing about them: What a loving, heartwarming family they are, how much joy they share at Christmas despite their poverty (it's no wonder that their humble yet happy Christmas dinner is one of the most iconic holiday scenes in all of literature), and how they support and comfort each other through the pain of Tiny Tim's death... or rather, how they would have if Scrooge's change of heart hadn't saved him. In the case of Mrs. Cratchit, I also like how unabashedly she despises Scrooge. Her husband Bob, of course, is the embodiment of goodwill who can't utter a word against him, so I'm glad that Dickens allows some righteous anger from her. It's annoying that the 1938 film cuts that part and has her cheerfully propose the toast to Scrooge instead – apparently, Hays Code-era Hollywood had more rigid ideas of how "the deserving poor" should behave than Dickens did.

Least favorite thing about them: Nothing about them personally. But if it's true that the Cratchits are idealized versions of John and Elizabeth Dickens and their children as they were during Charles's childhood (the oldest boy Peter corresponding to Charles himself), as Michael Patrick Hearn argued in The Annotated Christmas Carol, then it makes me a little sad to know that the real family was more dysfunctional than their fictional counterparts. But that has no bearing on how I view the characters.

Three things I have in common with them:

*I love Christmas.

*Like Mrs. Cratchit, I can't stand greedy, hard-hearted people like pre-redemption Scrooge.

*I can make very good mashed potatoes and homemade applesauce.

Three things I don't have in common with them:

*I'm not British.

*I haven't lived in poverty.

*I've never tasted roast goose, though I'd like to.

Favorite line:

From Mrs. Cratchit, in response to Bob's Christmas Day toast to Scrooge:

“The Founder of the Feast indeed! I wish I had him here. I’d give him a piece of my mind to feast upon, and I hope he’d have a good appetite for it.”

“I’ll drink his health for your sake and the Day’s, not for his. Long life to him! A merry Christmas and a happy new year! He’ll be very merry and very happy, I have no doubt!”

And following Tiny Tim's death in Christmas Yet to Come, her response to Peter's remark that Bob seems to have walked home more slowly lately:

“I have known him walk with—I have known him walk with Tiny Tim upon his shoulder, very fast indeed... But he was very light to carry, and his father loved him so, that it was no trouble: no trouble."

brOTP: Each other.

OTP: For Mrs. Cratchit, Bob. For the children, none until they're older.

nOTP: Each other, apart from Mrs. Cratchit and Bob.

Random headcanon: Peter Cratchit is the great-great grandfather of the Pevensie siblings in The Chronicles of Narnia and Peter Pevensie is named after him. Maybe this is a silly idea, since it only stems from the fact that they're both London families whose oldest sons happen to have the same name, but why not?

Unpopular opinion: I wish more adaptations would include all six Cratchit children from the book. Even some of the best adaptations reduce the number of children to five, four, or even three. I understand why this happens, since not all versions have the budget to include all six, but I always enjoy seeing them all. In the book, it's clear that the "two young Cratchits," the boisterous little boy and girl whose names are never mentioned, are a chief source of the family's Christmas cheer – probably because they're the most free to be lively, playful children, since Martha, Peter, and Belinda are more focused on helping their mother with the work of the feast, while Tiny Tim is too frail. Yet those two are the children who most often get the axe in adaptations, and I think that's a shame.

Song I associate with them:

"The Lord's Bright Blessing" from Mr. Magoo's Christmas Carol.

"Bless Us All" from The Muppet Christmas Carol.

"Christmas Together" from A Christmas Carol: The Musical.

"Yes, There Is a Santa Claus" from The Stingiest Man in Town (the subject has no basis in the book, but it's a rare solo for Martha Cratchit that shows her being a sweet big sister to Tiny Tim).

Favorite pictures of them:

This illustration by Sol Eytinge Jr.:

This illustration by E.A. Abbey:

This vintage illustration:

And this one:

This illustration by Roberto Innocenti:

From the 1938 film:

From Mr. Magoo's Christmas Carol, 1962:

From the 1970 musical Scrooge:

From the 1984 TV film:

From The Muppet Christmas Carol, 1992:

[i-aint-jackkerouac]

Dear Family and Friends,

 I’ve never written a Christmas letter before – I keep waiting for a good year but then I figured I was running out of years and maybe this year was as good as it gets.    

 Let’s start with the Missus because if Mama ain’t happy, ain’t nobody happy.  Emily has had a productive year, volunteering at the homeless shelter.  Well, to put it more precisely, she turned our house into a homeless shelter for unemployed relatives and hangers-on.  The house is over-flowing with hard cases, their brats and dogs – no wonder I work late at the office.  But what my wife can do with a hog’s cheek and a peck of turnips is simply amazing.  Jesus himself couldn’t perform more miracles with food than she does.

 Then there is Martha, our eldest, whom we hired out to a milliner. We haven’t seen her all year. To tell you the truth, I kind of forget what she looks like.  She sends her love, and money what she can.

 Our Peter, the golden boy, attended University until last semester when he had to drop out because we couldn’t afford the tuition.  Well, there go his dreams to become a doctor. I guess he’ll go to work though it’s nearly impossible to find a job right now. But hey, we’re grateful he’s not in a prison or a workhouse like so many of his friends! He tried to start up a chimney cleaning service but the banks aren’t lending.  So he’s a little down right now, rather mopey about life in general and finds consolation in the gin shops and pot houses with wastrels, idlers and low born people.  He says he’s writing a book, plans to be a writer.  We’re so proud of our Peter!      

 The middle children are all muddling through life, though I confess I sometimes mix them up (Lucy?  Matthew?  Belinda?) History won’t remember them either, poor things.  With any luck they’ll live to grow up, learn a trade, find a mate, reproduce, and know a few moments of true happiness while they are on this earth.  With any luck one of them will stick around to mind the Missus and I in our dotage.  

 I was given the boot last week.  Can you believe it?  Twenty years on the job and I was the best damn clerk that bastard ever had!  But my position was cut to make the end of the year financials look better for the banks and the shareholders. Well, fuck him. Now Mr. Scrooge will have to keep his own records and write his own memos, not to mention take care of all the other shit around the office that I normally do, like run to Starbucks for coffee and scones. We’ll just see how he manages with me gone, won’t we?  People are cheap these days and numbers rule -- it’s all about big profits for the principals and shareholders, to hell with the employees. Not that I’m complaining! Life is good!   

 Our youngest child is a real blessing (though I rued the day his mother told me she was pregnant – again...) Timmy is such a delight, he constantly reminds the rest of us about the true meaning of Christmas. And although he is weak and suffers from a rare genetic disease that won’t be identified for another century at least -- much less cured -- he is the best of us.  All he wants this Christmas is a goose for dinner and the company of family and friends.  

Please join us if you’re in the neighborhood.  I don’t know if we’ll have goose but we’ll damn sure have gin.      

 Peace on earth and as little Tim says, God bless us, every one!

 With kindest regards, etc. etc.

The Bob Cratchit family

19 December, 1843

( Linda Collison, 2012)