Share a Christmas Tradition

[SusieStone]

I thought it would be neat to get a view of traditions other people have within their family.

I'll start out.

Many of know I have a 6 year old and his father died at Halloween/All Saints Day. Anyway, when he was growing up, his mom would bake a birthday cake for Jesus and they would have a Jesus birthday party on Christmas Eve. In our house, we started that also. I decorate all the trees - last year I put up 7 ---- the one in the living room is left a bare spot front and center. On Christmas Eve, we read the Christmas story, again, and sing Happy Birthday To Jesus...we then hang a beautiful glass blown/keepsake ornament in the shape of a birthday cake in that bare spot. We then blow out the candles on the Jesus birthday cake and we have a party. Later we go to bed and the next morning, we get up to see all the gifts that Santa left celebrating Jesus' birthday since he couldn't be there for the party. (At the party we each give a gift to Jesus based on our heart - something we need to do for ourselves spiritually or something we feel that we need to do for others).

 

[Lisa]

We do a birthday cake for Baby Jesus too. With DD special needs, she is a more visual child so the cake helped it click that Christmas isn't all about Santa bringing gifts. I take out my Hummel baby Jesus and put him next to the cake, we sing happy birthday, and DD blows out the candle for baby Jesus.

 

[ddavis860]

This is sooooo funny.... We sing Happy Birthday to Baby Jesus too. It's a tradition that I started when my DS19 was a baby. I have a little manger scene, precious memories look alike, that goes on the cake, and I put 1 candle. And we sing "Happy Birthday Baby Jesus". No pies.

I also have ham on Christmas for dinner every year. With "Mamie's Coleslaw". Mamie was a neighbor at our old house. She knew my DH when he was a baby, and was like family. One year she showed me how she made her coleslaw...quite the coup, and so I make it for DH with the ham, since she has now passed. Tradition is that we enjoy "Mamie's Coleslaw" and remember her...

We also open 1 small giftie from Mom and Dad on Christmas Eve.

 

[patchchild]

New PJ's and a new book opened on Christmas Eve.

 

[aroyer]

I love the baby Jesus birthday celebrations idea!!

We do matching pj's for the kids. That is really the only the tradition we have so far. This is the first year that we will be home for Christmas morning in the 9 1/2 years DH and I have been married. I am hoping we forge new traditions this year.

 

[vanyel]

New PJ's and a new book opened on Christmas Eve.

I started buying my dds new pjs for Christmas Eve years ago. Can you believe they're in their mid 20s and still expect to get pjs? I mail them to where ever they're going to be on Christmas Eve. This year, one package will go to the future in-laws and the other will be in Detroit. Books - everyone gets a book in their stocking (and I buy myself one too!).

 

[Faerie]

I'm in my late 20's and still expect PJs from my mom on Christmas Eve.... how sad is that?

Our tradition is our Open House on Christmas Eve. Friends, Family, Food, it's a great night.

 

[BernardandMissBianca]

We go as a family and cut our tree down. We are very picky so it's an all day affair. Take pics, the whole nine yards.
We buy the kids an ornament every year, so when they are grown they will have full trees.
We read the Cajun Night before Christmas on Christmas Eve.
We always get fruit in our stockings, mom started that tradition. Dh thinks it's kind of silly but I like it.

That's all I can remember.

 

[AlexWyattMommy]

We have no real traditions now. We go to the ILs for every holiday and they don't have any special traditions.

Growing up we did. Christmas eve was always seafood and a special mushroom & bean soup (it is grosser than it sounds don't miss this one) and we alway had Oplatky, a Christmas Wafer, that was broken and passed around and eaten with honey.

Christmas moring was always wake up early, open presents, and then get in the car and drive 2-1/2 hours to visit the earlier generations in PA. Come home exhausted.

 

[momz]

we started something last year with our kids that we are continuing this year. they had a great time with it, and have been asking about it for the last month or so. We have "scout elves" assigned to our family. They come to observe our kids and any other children that come to visit. They are watching out for good/bad behavior and then give frequent reports back to Santa about what they observe. There are a lot of fun "rules" that apply. things like do not feed the elves (they may get lazy), do not play with the elves (they have job to do), do not talk about the elves looking funny (it will hurt their feelings), do not give the elves a bath, do not touch the elves, do not leave your toys out (the elves may play with them), etc... My husband and I secretly move the elves around. The kids love to discover what the elves are up to. The elves like to play hide and seek, they like to play with the kids toys, they like to raid the cookie jar, play with the bows and ribbons, and on and on.

 

[rlovew]

Growing up we always did secret angels- my mom would make a small bag of little things for us to leave out for whomever we drew and we had to do other things for them. We had our own places at the table and set jobs so many times we would find our jobs done by someone else or a little something at our place or left on our pillows. It was fun and kept us busy from the time we got out of school until Christmas Day.

We also have a stocking tradition- we open our stockings first but we do it very slowly. We go around starting with the youngest pulling out one item and then sharing how it reminds us of God and being filled with the Holy Spirit and the love of Jesus- so if we pull out an animal we might say that it reminds us of God's saving the animals on the ark, it is fun to hear what everyone has to say and it gets hard when you pull out the 5th apple and have to come up with something new. I think it took us about 1 1/2 hours the year that we had 9 children along with my parents (4 of the 5 of us our married). This year there will be 11 of us- me, DH, my Mom, dad, Sis, BIL, Brother, SIL, Brother 2, and 1 niece and 1 nephew.

We have so many Christmas traditions but these are 2 of my favorites.

Rebecca

 

[mrp4352]

I'm in my late 20's and still expect PJs from my mom on Christmas Eve.... how sad is that?

I'm 35 and I would get upset if I didn't get a pretty children's book (a pretty Night Before Christmas, or one of the Dr. Seuss book's I especially remember from growing up)

Our other tradition is the small glass coke bottles. For some reason, we have to have those when we come home from church on Christmas Eve - but they have to sit in the freezer for 20 minutes first so they get frosty. I don't know when it started, but I can't remember a Christmas with out them!

 

[mommy2mrb]

We always go to the giving tree at the mall, pick a girl who is DD age and DD goes through her stuffed animals and we donate them to the fire dept who hand them out to children at emergencies.
ever since DD was born, we have gone "home" to WA for christmas, we stay at my mom's house. we drive up (16 hours, usually do it in two days).

christmas eve we go out for a nice early dinner (3 ish), childrens mass at church at 5, then back to my mom's house. We light the fire, grandma reads the night before christmas to DD and DN and they get to open their special present from grandma and opens her's from them. We take turns opening a gift, eats our yummy snacks, sip on our hot toddys and enjoy being together.
My cousin and his family usually show up sometime during the evening and we are usually in bed by midnight. Everyone spends the night.
christmas morning.......SANTA......kids always read their letters from santa first, then stockings, then their gifts. Mom makes a big breakfast, we try to get the house presentable and then head down to DH dad's house, his brothers family meets us there. Since MIL passed, FIL doesn't do any decorating or want to have dinner, but wants to see the kids and give them their gifts, we always head over to see DH aunt and uncle and then head back to my mom's and have quiet dinner with her and collapse.

 

[ksjayhawks]

• 
  We have several things that we do:
• We do new pjs for Christmas Eve.
• We read the nativity story and then add baby Jesus to the nativity.
• I make jello jiggler shepherd's crooks and serve them with the mini coated shredded wheat as part of our xmas eve meal.
• I also hide a pickle ornament in the tree and everyone loves looking for it. I have small presents for each person that finds it. It is fun to watch everyone search--only one at a time--the first people love to bug the later ones!
• We also go to xmas eve service--I love the one where you get out at midnight after the candlelight service, but our church here doesn't do that.
• Whoever hands out the gifts in the morning wears the santa hat and you must wear pj's to get your presents!
• We all get a piece of fruit in our stocking also.
• Our new tradition is spending xmas eve--after church services--with our neighbors. There are four families that get together and we have such a good time. Some years other relatives of the four families join us--this year will be our dd, dsil, dgd, dgs and hosts sister and family. The more the merrier. It is so fun to watch the kiddos as they are soooo excited and happy! Usually everyone wears dressier clothes to make it very festive as well!

 

[Kim1964]

-Every year we pick a child off the giving tree at church and buy them some Christmas presents.
-After church on Christmas Eve, DD#2's godparents come over and we have Chinese food for dinner. They have started a tradition of giving the girls a personalized ornament each year.
-I picked up some plastic goblets at Pier One a few years back and they are our "special occasion" cups. There are 4 of us and 4 different colors, and we break them out on holidays. DD#2 (5 yo) especially loves them and will remind me to get them out.
-Our Christmas cards have been photo cards from our Disney trip for the past couple of years.....as long as I can keep convincing DH to go every year, I'll keep this up as long as the kids will let me.
-There is a local charity that sells ceramic angel ornaments at a table in the mall every year. I started buying them when I was pregnant with DD#1 (1995, born 1996) and it's the only thing that gets me to the mall after Thanksgiving. Someday I am going to have enough to do a small tree all in angels.

 

[IMALOVNDISNEY]

I have tried to keep alot of the same traditions I grew up with. Here are a few of my favorites.

I also got a new pair of pjs Christmas Eve, as does my DD, I even buy myself new jammies.

DD gets to open 1 presents before going to bed. I was able to give her the pjs to open and she was ok with that for a couple of yrs. ,but, soon caught on. So now the pjs are just an exra.

Stockings are the first thing opened and we sit down and go through every little thing in them. Stockings are just as much fun as the bigger presents in my family. Also, each person that is coming for dinner will have a stocking of their own when they arrive.

We also have a person sized stocking that has alot of misc gifts and gadget in it that are wrapped for the unexpected guest that may stop by. No one leaves without a gift. Even though these are all favorites, this up at the top because my DM did this and now many many years later my siblings and I each do this in our own homes.

Thank you OP for starting this thread. Gives me warm fuzzies.

 

[party of 3]

we do the pj's thing too! that's so funny that so many of us do it. we usually leave a gift on my sons night light table to let him know that santa has been there. he gets all excited when he gets up and sees it. this year we are starting something new- we are going to put a tree in my sons room and let him decorate it however he wants.

 

[New England Eeyore]

we do the pj's thing too! that's so funny that so many of us do it. we usually leave a gift on my sons night light table to let him know that santa has been there. he gets all excited when he gets up and sees it. this year we are starting something new- we are going to put a tree in my sons room and let him decorate it however he wants.

I had a tree in my room when I was little and it's one of my favorite memories! My grandmother made me some special Strawberry Shortcake ornaments and I had Muppets and Disney ones too!

 

[ThreeMusketeers]

I have gotten pjs on xmas even since i was a small child, and so did dh, so we passed that along to our little one. Every xmas we make sugar cookies for Santa, then We also have a xmas eve "snack night" where we just make a ton of orderves (sp) and watch a xmas movie. Usually a nice kid xmas movie, put the kiddo's to bed, after we put on our new jamies and read the night before xmas of course with a nice cup of hot coaco. then dh and i watch Xmas Vacation together. (never get sick of that one.) Oh we also keep an eye on Santa Tracker every year through out the evening. =) DD really gets a kick out of that.
On christmas day, we do the usual, we get up VERY early, eat "Christmas Cereal" a tradition dh's family started with him when he was little, since they weren't very well off, and always had to buy very generic cereal, so each xmas they let the kids pick their very own name brand cereal. LOL So we do that as a family now. We also made a CHristmas Family Soundtrack, we compilied all the songs we LOVE for the holidays and put them all on one CD, and thats the CD we listen to xmas morning while opening gifts and chatting. We open, for HOURS. Take our time, and play with things as we go. Just enjoy e/o's company.
As far as our tree, we usually cut it down. But we are doing that this weekend, dd usualy goes to see santa that same day at the mall. And dh and i *hopefully* will spend a romantic evening by the xmas lights. =) Anyway.. I am rambling. Just LOVE the holidays!!

 

[PrincessNancy96]

Here are some of our traditions..
1. The kids get new PJ's... the one gift they get to open on Christmas Eve.
2. Christmas Eve dinner consists of a big meal. Ham, mashed pototoes, dinner rolls, corn, and cherry cheese cake.
3. The kids remember to put out Reindeer food (carrots and oats), and of course milk and cookies for Santa. {DH nearly freaked last year because I hadn't gotten the carrots.. lucky for us our neighbors had some so they sent them over when I called in a panic!}
4. Kids sprink magic glitter around the house to signal they have been good all year and to please stop by... (glitter consists of punched sn**flakes, and red, green and silver glitter).
5. Each room has a theme... I'll take some photos this year.. but the living room is the sn**man room, hallyway sn**flakes, dining room is Santa, kitchen Disney themed, entry way is angels..to name a few.
6. Each child's room has a small tree they decorate as they wish...
7. DH and I have a special tree in our room... It's decorated in silver, blue and white and is gorgeous!! Our kids love to come down and watch movies with us in our cool room...
8. We have 2 Christmas on Christmas morning.. One for the 3 kids we have together... and we have a bigger Christmas when our sons from his previous marriage arrive.. The kids think it's great because they have 2 big unwrapping parties...
9. The tradition that annoys me most... is DH falling asleep and me lugging all the gifts to their destination under the tree... UH, hello!!!! This is an every year tradition..and if you ask; he will deny!
10. I wrap the gifts by myself.. DH goes and watches tv.. *really it's a tradition I started because he was forever playing with the noisy toys when the kids were sleeping!*