Friday Faves - Holiday Tradition

Friday Faves: Holiday Tradition

There are so many wonderful traditions that my family has had over the years...cutting our own Christmas tree down at the local farm was one of our favorites. There were others...

Baking cookies together, especially my Gramma's secret Scottish Shortbread. You know the one... The-I'd-give-it-to-you-but-I'd-have-to-kill-you-after-so-why-bother-recipe.

Decorating the tree together...well...basically it was Mom sitting on the couch directing Dad to string up the lights a certain way while my sister and I followed him with the tangled up twisted mess...half of which didn't work (which we didn't know until after they were strung). The ornaments? Well, let's just say that they were old, hand-made or half broken...except for those balls with the hair hanging off of them. Whoever came up with the idea to string soft fabric over styrofoam obviously never had a real tree with real branches that would get caught in them causing them fray all over the tree. Eew!

Another tradition we had was with the whole family. My parents would invite everyone in the family (both sides!) over later in the afternoon on Christmas. Before the company came though, we would not only have to clean the house top to bottom, but would have to arrange every one of our gifts under the tree as neat as a pin so we could do the "hey, look what I got" thing as each of them entered the door. My parents weren't rich nor did they brag, so I'm not sure why they wanted to flaunt the gazillion gifts they bought us for Christmas....from the big fat Bonnie Bell lip gloss on a string, to our bean bag chairs, to the handmade hats and scarves we'd get every year. I think the gifts sat there for about a week before we were allowed to put them away in our rooms and play with them. Go figure!


What's up with those bulbs?!?


Yup, that's me in my big red vinyl bean bag chair - far out!

With that being said, most of those traditions are now gone. Smart decision huh? That last one was a tradition that I personally laid to rest!!!! We have made some of our own family traditions with our children...two of them really stick out in my mind...

We still cut down our own Christmas tree each year - it's a total blast and the memories we make are truly priceless! The best time to go is when there's snow on the ground, but it doesn't happen every year. We hike all over the rolling hills to find that 'oh so perfect' tree. When we do, Daddy and Lionel saw it down together. After putting it on the van, we go grab some hot cocoa and enjoy the wonderful surroundings for a bit before heading home.





The other 'tradition' we have in our family lasts the entire month of December. Beginning on December 1st (tomorrow!), we each write something down on a piece of paper that we're thankful to the Lord for on that particular day. We then put our papers into a stocking we so aptly call 'The Jesus Stocking'. On Christmas Eve, we have a birthday party for baby Jesus (complete with cake) and we open up the stocking. Daddy reads all the papers we put into it throughout the month. The kids especially love to hear all that God has done for us just in such a short time. It's encouraging, and it reminds us that God is always with us! He gives us so much more than we need, when all we truly need is Him!! He is the real reason for the season!

Traditions or not, I hope you make some very happy memories with your family this Christmas!!