Traditioooooon, TRADITION!
This phrase is the only thing I remember from watching our high school’s production of Fiddler on the Roof ten years ago (and the fact that the male lead was my best friend’s boyfriend, but that’s not really relevant). Anytime I think about the word “tradition”, I always want to break out in song. Which, based on my last post, I’m sure you would beg me not to. :)
Anyway, as the holidays are approaching I’ve been thinking a lot about traditions. We’re attending a parenting class for Sunday School and one thing that our teacher said was that holidays and family vacations are kind of like the cornerstone of the memories our children will have of their childhood. I think this is very true as I recall the memories from my own childhood. Most of my memories revolve around a holiday, birthday or a family vacation.
Since both boys are at the ages now when they actually enjoy festivities and such, I think now is a great time to begin instilling traditions into our holidays. Here are just a few traditions my family did as a child that I would like to do with our little family now:
- Santa Visit on Christmas Eve. Every Christmas Eve, we would head upstairs and everyone would sit on the floor, overlooking the balcony at my parent’s house. We would read The Polar Express and at some time during that book, Santa would walk through our front door and deliver some of our presents (the rest would come after we were asleep, we were told). Even after I “knew”, I still couldn’t figure out who was in the suit since all of our family was present. It turns out that it was a dear friend of the family who goes to our church (who also did it for his own grandchildren). This is one of the single greatest memories I have from my childhood! I’m on the hunt for a Santa suit, so tell me if you know of any good deals!
- The Twelve Days of Christmas. For the 12 days prior to December 25, my mom would place a small gift in our stockings each day. It wasn’t every anything big (normally candy, gum, lip gloss, etc), but it was something we always looked forward to. With 5 children, I know this was a lot of work for her, but a memory I treasure. I would like to do this with my boys this year, but add a giving element as well. Perhaps we could incorporate twelve days of serving prior to Christmas as well by delivering a meal to our elderly grandparents, volunteering to ring the bell for the Salvation army, etc. I want to make sure that our children understand and appreciate the concept of giving when there is a tendency for children in our culture to just want to “get”.
And this idea is from Prince Charming’s childhood:
- Live Christmas Trees (that can be planted afterwards). For a couple years in Prince Charming’s “growing up years” his family bought real Christmas trees to plant afterwards. Each year a different child got their very own tree. Then, they could look outside in the yard and see “hey, that’s my Christmas tree from when I was __.” For Big Brother’s First Christmas, we bought a very large, live Christmas tree that would be planted in the yard right after Christmas. We had the intention of doing this for every child’s “First Christmas” but neglected to do so for Little Brother in the craziness of just having a baby last year (plus we were pretty sure we would be moving soon). Now that we’re settled in our new house, we thought it would be a great time to reinstate this tradition!
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| Big Brother’s First Christmas Tree (we liked the fact that it was crooked and very “CharlieBrownish”)
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ohh what great Christmas traditions! I love the 12 days of Christmas in the stockings and also adding giving into that! We always got to open 1 present on Christmas Eve.. it was pjs every year.. and it was still so much fun! Then we got to wear them on Christmas morning :-) This year I am starting a caroling tradition. My husband's family sings beautifully.. me pretty much the opposite… but I love it :-) So I will sing quietly ;-)
I love hearing others traditions!Here is a favorite for christmas:
We do 25 days of christmas books. Kind of like an advent calendar but with books. I have a basket of Christmas books that I wrap and my daughter gets to pick one every night to read leading up to christmas. I got most of the books after christmas when she was first born so they were 1/2 off. To be honest this year we have more than 25 so we will start this year after thanksgiving.
My hubby's birthday is shortly before Christmas, and we started a tradition when we had only been dating a few months. Each year on his birthday, or as close to it as possible, we dress up and go get a family picture made with Santa Claus. I love looking back and seeing how our family has changed and grown over the years.
Love the real tree idea, I wonder if I can just grow it in a pot as we live in a condo… We do a gingerbread house every December, the kids really love this tasty tradition :)
Fun ideas! We always get new pajamas on Christmas Eve. We also do the 25 books of Christmas that I connect with our advent calendar. And every year during the week of Christmas my husband, the boys and I bake cookies together as a family-each of us picks a different kind of cookie-and then we take them to our neighbors.
I LOVE the 25 days of Christmas books idea…I am definitely adopting that one for our family.
My childhood years were FULL of traditions. And I love that you made a post devoted solely to traditions!! For my extended family, we are VERY close (almost like immediate family) and as we've grown up our holiday traditions have always been the one thing that have given us a common ground and brought us back together. No matter how far apart we live or how life is going for us. It's has been a Godsend to our family!
My FAVORITE tradition is that on Christmas Eve every year my entire family (which keep in mind would often be 30+ people in one living room) would gather around the Christmas tree and listen to my Granddaddy read the Christmas story out of the Bible. Then we would go around the room, and one-at-a-time, we would each say #1. One thing we were thankful for from the year that had passed. And then we would go around again and say…
#2. One thing that we hoped (a prayer request) for the year to come. We would often write these down and give a copy to everyone!
After everyone had a turn for each we would pray. We would finish the night by my Grandmommie handing out "Bed nights" or Christmas pajamas to everyone and then going about enjoying Christmas goodies and cider!
Those memories are priceless to me and some I hope will live on through our families now, as we have all grown up and have families of our own.
I've been thinking of doing the new Christmas book each night during December. We don't have enough Christmas books, but I'm thinking I will supplement with ones from the library.
Once my brother and I moved out of the house my mom admited it was too much work to fill everyone's stocking by herself. Now everyone (we've expanded to include spouses and kids) contributes something to each stocking. It's fun to pick up little surprises for everyone and we still do it annonymously, as if Santa really visited.
I wanted to mention…the "12 days of Christmas" actually begin on December 25 and go on into January, until the Feast of Epiphany. I try to keep our decorations up until then, rather than letting opening gifts on Christmas Day be the end of the season. Also, it's great for the projects, cookie making, etc., I wanted to do but ran out of time for…I can say it's still the Christmas season!
We have 2 traditions that have definitely become ours. **We get a permit to cut down our own Christmas tree. Once we drag the tree back to the car we have a picnic on the snow.
**About 5 years ago we went to the thrift store wanting to buy a potatoe peeler to make homemade french fries so I found the closest thing, took it up to register and the cashier said, "Why do you want to a snowcone maker this time of year?" So by default eating snowcones and homemade french fries have become our Christmas eve traditions.
We buy our kids new pajamas that they get to open on Christmas Eve and wear that night to bed! We also read Luke 2 first thing Christmas morning.
Christmas is by far the biggest holiday in our family. We have 5 must do traditions:
1- Growing up we always had elves visit our house several times in December leading up to the big day. They would leave little gifts like books and candies (like your pre-Christmas stockings) and notes reminding us to be good or complimenting something we'd recently done to get on the 'good list.' Our assigned elves were Buzz & Gruff and the same ones signed our notes every year. We would also leave them notes asking them to relay our wishes to Santa and when leaving cookies for the big man we'd be sure to put some there for them too. I have a feeling Buzz and Gruff will be my son's elves too. (I'm sure Santa has some kind organization system to keep them with the same families.)
2-We ALWAYS read The Littlest Angel out loud as a family on Christmas eve, taking turns from year to year. This started when I was very small with the golden books version and has been tradition for 30 years. As the kids have moved out, we've each been given our own copy.
3- We open one present each before going to bed.
4-The kids are not allowed out of their rooms until the parents are up. Therefore, our morning tradition is for them to sneak into each others' rooms and then sing carols as loud as possible to wake up the folks.
5- We always have Dad's Egg Benedict after opening presents.
I know this was a lot of sharing. Sorry for rambling but man, this got me excited!!! Is it December yet??
This tradition comes from my husband's family: We all attend the candlelight Christmas Eve service at church and then afterwards we have oyster stew and open a few presents.
Ps You could check at http://www.orientaltrading.com for a Santa suit.
We had 2 traditions
1. Open 2 gift on Christmas eve which was always pjs, and a baby doll(or car if boy, we dont have boys :(.. )
2. Driveing around looking at Christmas lights
We have many more that i've read about that will be doing this year now that our kids are older!
I got out Santa suit at Wal-Mart…
Last year we started a tradition with our son, since we don't have a fireplace we have a santa key. My mom found this and its a magic key that fits anyone house that doesn't have a fireplace to those kids can get presents too!!