“How Lily Stole Christmas”
←	HIMYM episode 2x11 (33)	→
First aired: December 11, 2006
Director: Pamela Fryman
Writer: Brenda Hsueh
Barney's Blog
Images (6)

A rift forms between Lily and Ted after they find an old answering machine message where Ted badmouths Lily after she left Marshall.

Contents 1 Recap 2 Continuity 3 Gallery 4 Memorable Quotes 5 Notes and Trivia 5.1 Goofs and Errors 5.2 Allusions and Outside References 5.3 Music 5.4 Other Notes 6 Guests 7 Reception 8 References 9 External Links 10 Comments

RecapEdit

Its Christmas time in The Apartment and the whole room is full of festive decorations. Marshall is heading to the law library to work on a report. He leaves with his hands over his eyes claiming that Lily's "Winter Wonderland" is his reward for a job well done.

Lily comes across the old answering machine for the apartment. She and Ted find few messages remaining on the machine. One message was for Marshall, recorded by Ted when the former was still pining over Lily who had left him:

"Hey, Marshall, are you lying on the couch right now moping about Lily? You are, aren't you? Well, stop it! She's not worth it. You gotta get over that grinch!"

Future Ted clarifies that he had not in fact used the word "grinch." Instead, he said "a bad word. A very, very bad word."

Lily is horrified. She demands to know how Ted could say such a thing. Ted struggles to explain that he had been desperate to get Marshall out of his slump during Lily's absence. He had tried to help him get over it by knocking her off the pedestal Marshall kept her on. He claims he was merely doing his duty as Marshall's best friend.

Down at the bar, Ted recounts this all to Robin and Barney. Robin says that at least he apologized but Ted admits that he had not apologized to Lily. Instead, a fight broke out. Ted maintained that he was only trying to help Marshall after Lily left. In fact, he even states that he won't apologize because that summer she had been a "grinch". Lily says that he will be sorry.

During Ted's conversation with Barney and Robin, it becomes apparent that Barney has a cold. He denies it but fails at picking up a girl when he sneezes all over her.

Ted, Robin and Barney head upstairs with Barney continuing to deny that he is sick. Ted has a mug of beer in hand. He explains to Robin that the beer was an offering he used to make back in college when the two were fighting. However, when they enter the apartment the find that all of "Winter Wonderland" is gone. Lily stole Christmas!

Robin tries to convince Barney that he belongs home in bed after finding him attempting to smoke a cigar out on the fire escape. He is vehement in his assertions of health. Ted gets Lily on the phone and learns that she has taken the decorations to her apartment. She explains that she would deal with a foul-mouthed student by calling their parents. But Ted should know better. She hangs up before Ted can finish demanding she return the decorations. Ted heads out to the Bronx to confront Lily at her apartment.

On the way he speaks to Marshall who is excited about the Winter Wonderland and then is interrupted by a call from his mother who is angry about Ted's bad language. Meanwhile, Robin has convinced Barney to rest in Ted's bed. De-suited, he is miserable about his predicament but allows Robin to feed him soup.

Ted confronts Lily in her apartment which is cramped with the decorations. He begs Lily to come home. He apologizes for calling her "that word" but Lily says he is faking the apology and still mad. She explains that she apologized to Marshall who has forgiven her and they have moved on. Why can't Ted? Ted admits that he is mad because she never apologized to him. Ted was upset with her for leaving him too. "We're supposed to be friends," he says. They start to argue and Ted calls her a "grinch" again. Ted says that she can return to the apartment because he won't be there and instead will be spending Christmas Eve with his cousin.

Marshall comes home with a package under his arm. Lily has returned the decorations leaving Marshall none-the-wiser. He tells her about the adventure he had getting her the package and then helping the delivery man bring presents to others throughout the day so people will have presents in time for Christmas.

The present is an Easy-Bake Oven. Lily is surprised because, while she had always wanted one as a child, she had never told Marshall. Marshall explains that the suggestion actually came from Ted. One night, back in college, Marshall and gone out; Ted and Lily were high and Lily told Ted about it. Lily is touched that Ted remembered the tidbit and suddenly feels guilty for forcing Ted to spend Christmas with his family.

Ted is on Staten Island spending Christmas with his ultra-Christian cousin, Stacy, and her family. The doorbell rings and Ted finds Marshall, Robin, Barney and Lily holding a mug of beer. She and Ted exchange apologies and the gang heads home.

ContinuityEdit

• Ted's cousin and her family are mentioned in Brunch. Ted tells Robin that she'll know that his mother is about to ask her about having children by first bringing up his cousin Stacy who has six children.
• It's the first time Ted mentions his mom's boyfriend Clint. They get married in Home Wreckers.
• Barney says "When I start feeling sick, I stop being sick and be awesome instead. True story." This is an altered version of his sadness solution used in Where Were We?.

GalleryEdit

For a listing of all images on the wiki tagged as being from this episode, see Category:How Lily Stole Christmas images.

Memorable QuotesEdit

Notes and TriviaEdit

Goofs and ErrorsEdit

Allusions and Outside ReferencesEdit

• The title of the episode alludes to the Dr. Seuss book How the Grinch Stole Christmas!.
• Ted notes that Lily would laugh at almost anything, even something as bad as Weekend at Bernie's II.
• The way Marshall runs when he tries to catch up with the delivery truck is a reference to Kevin running in Home Alone 2: Lost in New York
• When the friends come to rescue Ted from his family on Staten Island, he says, "I'll get it" and runs quickly to the door. Ted's cousin Stacey asks, "Who is it?" and he is told to say "It's carol singers." Then Barney, Marshall, and Robin sing "Silent Night" while Lily and Ted make amends. This scene references the film Love Actually, in the scene where Mark (Andrew Lincoln) comes to Juliet's (Keira Knightley) door to say he loves her using cue cards, following the aforementioned pattern.
• Ted calling Lily a "grinch", and Future Ted saying that Ted didn't say "grinch", but a "very, very bad word" instead is a reference to A Christmas Story, where Ralphie says "fudge". Ted also says, "Oh, fudge," with Future Ted narrating, "But I didn't say 'fudge'," which was taken directly from the film.

MusicEdit

• Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy - Tchaikovsky's The Nutcracker
• Dance of the Mirlitons - Tchaikovsky's The Nutcracker
• Waltz of the Flowers - Tchaikovsky's The Nutcracker
• Trepak (Russian Dance) - Tchaikovsky's The Nutcracker
• Pas de Deux - Tchaikovsky's The Nutcracker
• Back Door Santa - Clarence Carter (this song was removed from the DVD release)
• Silent Night

Other NotesEdit

• Zachary Gordon who played one of Stacy's children also played Grant/Tyler in The Stinsons.
• One of the only episodes where marijuana is called "Weed" and not "Sandwich".

GuestsEdit

• Moon Zappa - Stacy
• Cristine Rose - Virginia Mosby
• Michael Gross - Alfred Mosby
• Harry Groener - Clint
• Carlease Burke - WPD Worker
• Marcus Folmar - WPD Driver
• Hannah Payne - Stacy's daughter Charity
• Zachary Gordon - Stacy's son
• Anne-Michelle Seiler - Brunette
• William Ramos Jr. - New Yorker

ReceptionEdit

Joel Keller of TV Squad said it was a good episode, and an improvement over the previous year's New Year's Eve episode. ^[1]

ReferencesEdit

External LinksEdit

• How Lily Stole Christmas at the English Wikipedia
• How Lily Stole Christmas at the Internet Movie Database
• How Lily Stole Christmas at TV.com

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