Blake Shelton, Father’s Last Christmas Together Is Treasured Memory

Christmas will be bittersweet for Blake Shelton and wife Miranda Lambert this year, as Blake will spend his first holiday without his father, Dick Shelton, who passed away in January. And although the 36-year-old singer has plenty of fond memories of Christmases with his dad, perhaps none is as poignant as their final one together last year, while his father fought for his life in the hospital.

"My sister, she has a husband with two kids now, and they were doing their normal Christmas Eve with the kids," Blake recalls to Country Weekly. "And Miranda has a tradition of going out and spending Christmas Eve with her family in Texas, and I normally go down there with her, too. But I said, 'If it's OK with everybody, I'm just going to stay up here with Dad."

The two men spent the evening doing one of their favorite activities. "It ended up being Dad and I on Christmas Eve, sitting in his hospital room and watching 'Dumbest Stuff on Wheels' for about four hours on his little TV there in the room," the Oklahoma native recalls. "I wouldn't trade that night for anything."

Blake also managed to bring the Christmas spirit into his dad's hospital room. "I brought a few gifts for him that people sent with me, so he got to open some things that night. It was a special night, it really was."

The reigning CMA Entertainer of the Year says those moments with his father were the best present of all. "He got a lot sicker after that. I think if everybody in the family had known, you couldn't have fit another person in the hospital room."

While Blake will certainly have some bittersweet moments this Christmas season, the country music superstar is putting others in the holiday spirit with the recently-released album, Cheers, It's Christmas, and his own TV special, "Not So Family Christmas," which includes appearances from Reba McEntire, Christina Aguilera and Kelly Clarkson. The special airs Monday, Dec. 3 at 10:00 PM ET on NBC.