the kids about to open their christas pajamas last christmas!This will be our first christmas away from family. We spent our first christmas married with my family and every other christmas eve and christmas day has been spent with Lawrences family. We have so many great christmas memories. I am both sad and excited about this christmas. It will be hard to be away from all our family this christmas...especially seeing as we dont' really have any close friends here yet. But I am kinda excited to be able to create our very own family traditons! Which brings me to my question for you all. What are some of your favorite family traditions around christmas time? I have many great memories of traditions my parents had when we were growing up. I loved going driving on christmas even to look at peoples christmas lights, i loved that my mom would always buy us a special cereal for christmas morning (special means sugary by the way). Another favorite was our "santa's helper" game. My dad would always be "santa" on christmas morning and one of us kids would get to be his elf for that christmas. he would pull a present for each child from under the tree and the elf would bring it to the person. then when we all had a gift in hand he would say "go" and we would all frantically open our gift. It was loads of fun. Another favorite that I have taken on for my own kids is that each year my mom would buy us a new ornament for the tree. you an image the crowded mess our tree was in by the time we were all old enough to move out!! But our tree's were always so beautiful and filled with memories!! My dad still hangs a paper plate ornament on his tree that i made when i was four, and yes i will readily admit that it makes me warm and fuzzy to see that paper plate hanging there.
One tradition that I started a couple christmases ago is sewing my kids a new pair of pajama pants that they get to open and wear on christmas eve. This year might prove difficult as there are no fabric stores in fort mcmurray....i'll have to try and order online and hope it gets here on time. I would really love to hear of all your favorite...and maybe not so favorite family christmas traditions! Or even ones that you wish you had or are planning on starting this year!! OOHHH, i just can't wait for your answers!!!
9 comments:
The boys get new jammies Christmas eve. They also get to open one present.
We always have one night where we get some timmies hot chocolate and go driving looking at lights with our Christmas music blaring. So fun!!
We've started (2 years ago) the tradition of hiding the "pickle ornament" in the tree. The first person to find it gets to open the special present.(usually a treat wrapped up they can share).
We also have a Santa Claus key that gets put out on the back door so that he can let himself in. The 2 bigger boys know there isn't a Santa but Gavin still believes.
We read Twas the night before Christmas on Christmas Eve and The STory of Jesus(usborne books).
In Jaffray we go caroling on the horse drawn sleighs(amazing!!), have a night where we watch the nativity scene and drink hot chocolate.
Christmas morning I make a breakfast casserole and we have a later brunch.
It's a season all about love...
As soon as me and my sister and brother were old enough *and tall enough* we were the official tree decorators...i still miss doing it with my sister...its been like 4 years :( And we had all the made by us decorations and my mom still puts them up...i get warm and fuzzy from it too lol
We always got to open our stockings whenever we wanted...as long as we slept first. And suprisingly enough we actually slept first lol...usually for only a couple hours because the excitement was unbearable lol. And then we went back to sleep and always every year we woke our parents up around 8am and had to wait in agonizing pain for them to "wake up" parents are evil i swear lol. As we got older or didnt live at home at the time we usually still managed to wake them up but with coffee and breakfast :)
Now me and jer have our christmas together whenever as long as its actually christmas day...like when we lived in quesnel our chistmases were at 4am lol Then we go to sleep and by 9am were up again and off visiting family and if we still had energy we'd visit friends :)
Josh's family and my family did Christmas VERY different. What I love about Christmas is Christmas EVE, we all get together and bring all the presents. We have Heidi's homemade eggnog and appy's. We sing and Papa reads the Christmas story from the bible while the little ones act it out. Sometimes we have the older kids read too.
Then we open presents. I like presents the best when opened one at a time, so we can all see what the person got! I don't like the mad frenzy;)
Then Christmas morning the kids play with their new things, we have coffe and roll kuchen (yummy german cookie cakes).
Sometimes I wish that our tradition was to go to Hawaii for Christmas! :)
My mom used to give us Jammies to open on Christmas Eve too. For many of my Christmases it was just me and my mom and she used to make home made eggnog ( but no nutmeg-she hated nutmeg) and we'd have store bought snacks ( a BIG deal in our house) One year my mom tried to make our jammies. I remember trying on mine and the one sleeve was twice as long as the other. We all laughed so hard!
Star, could you use a flannel sheet? Or none of those in the stores either? ( my poor baby living in the Arctic)
mmmm roll kuchen!!! we usually make that in the summer though and have it with fresh watermelon. Pistachio pudding is always on our table at christmas! I never thought of a flat sheets...i'll have a look at walmart and see. Thanks for sharing everyone! loving it!!!
We always opened our stockings on christmas eve and presents in the morning, mom would always be half asleep in her chair, and dad sitting there drinking his coffee i havent had a christmas at home in 4 years, its still hard being at aunt shirleys seeing everyone but its gotten better and harder since we have andrew! I have continued the stockings haha with arguments with jason, after we did presents we would get ready for church and then go to my aunts for a big breakfast i think that was one of my favorite parts!
Buy fabric when you're up here!
Traditions in our home:
-We drive around a couple day's before Christmas and look at Christmas lights.
-My Mom and I go out for breakfast Christmas Eve morning and then finish our shopping
-We have appies on Christmas Eve and open presents from Nana and Papa and Auntie and Uncle. My Mom reads the Christmas story and my kid's open their Christmas PJ's. Once the kid's are in bed...we finishing wrapping presents.
-Christmas morning we open presents and stockings. I make eggs benedict and we just relax until we go to Kitimat to have Christmas dinner with my extended family.
-And no Christmas season would be complete without boxing day shopping. We get a sitter and head out early for breakfast and then we hit the stores!
Oh Boxing Day Sales...I literally had butterflies when I read that!!! I think the excitement of meeting up with friends tops the sales we find once we get there.lol!
Our traditions:
-Christmas Eve Jammies & any other item that might go with the jammies (housecoat, slippers, socks, etc...)
-We always watch at least 1 christmas movie on Christmas Eve or Day.
-We always do stockings last, cause they're our favorite.
-Leah & I organize all the gifts to be beside each family member's designated seat (which Leah assigns...lol) to make for easy opening...though I like the chaos more!
-We have appies Christmas Eve and then appies all day Christmas Day...minus the dinner...obviously.
-We play ALOT of games on Christmas Day and usually stay in our jammies all day too. Its awesome!!
I'm excited you are getting to start your own...but wish you were here and part of ours :(
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