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Let’s get into the festive season! What are some traditions for you and your family over the holidays? Spiritual, cultural, activities, or recipes? My family always has “A Christmas Story” playing in the background on TNT all of Christmas Eve. We also have a felt homemade rat named “Ralph” that goes inside the tree with another little rat. I don’t know the story other than my grandma made them in the 70s and now we have Ralph the Christmas rat. 🤣🐭🎅
Every year for about 20 years I have bought a bird ornament for my Christmas tree, some years I buy more than one. It’s a tradition that was built on a bluebird Christmas ornament my mom gave me and the Christmas carol Winter Wonderland.
I have a felt mouse on my tree. My mom made it a long time ago using a pattern from the 1984 or 1985 Better Homes and Gardens magazine.
We have eaten the same food for the past two decades:
Christmas Eve dinner: fondu
Christmas Day dinner: rouladenNot counting leftovers, we never eat either of these on any other ocassion throughout the year.
We go Christmas tree hunting the day after thanksgiving. It stays up until New Year’s Day.
Depending on work schedules, we have adapted to having Thanksgiving dinner either 2 days early or even a week later. It is said that a man’s home is his castle. Well, I’ve come to believe that the chef’s kitchen is his/hers and you do not enter the King/Queen’s kitchen when they’re the one holding “Excalibur”; which is a nickname for a really big knife but with all due respect to King Arthur on Camelot. My nephew, who turned 14 this year, has developed a very good green thumb so he has planted, grown, picked, cut, and seasoned potatoes which have been part of our family’s Thanksgiving dinner for the last 5 years. After dinner, we digest it all while watching “National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation” on tv, on dvd or vhs, or streaming.
Does it ever seem as though people will ask you to help them with something but, when the time comes, they won’t lift a finger except for maybe the middle finger; and I’m sure we know that it doesn’t mean ‘You’re number 1’. I once gave my mother the day off on Thanksgiving. I took care of dinner and I protected her from any favors that were sent via phone calls, texts, emails, Yodeling Guy, or smoke signals from people who suddenly decided that they were physically and mentally incapable of doing anything on their own; the same people who couldn’t bear the thought, or the practice, of saying ‘Please’ or ‘Thank you’ which made me wonder if they could even spell those words, let alone understand how much courtesy and respect it shows when someone makes the time to say those words. But my mother knew all of our dogs special medical needs and what foods they could have so I backed off and let her resume command over her kitchen.
Another holiday tradition of mine is buying a gift card for my nephew to a book store; a minor investment in his education. We, too, partake of the 24-hour “A Christmas Story” marathon but I’m going to include “Willy Wonka & The Chocolate Factory” and “The Wizard of Oz” on HBO/Max this year.
Our tree is usually put up the day after thanksgiving. I have ornaments m mother crafted every year for us as kids. Then my sons while she was still alive. The homemade crafts the boys made. Other ones i made. Try to do a special one each year. Christmas eve is usually Lasange and garlic bread. Cinnamon candied popcorn is a must. We play some games. On Christmas morning, everyone can open their stocking when they wake. Then I make French toast and bacon. Then we open gifts. The kids pick a gift and give to the person who it’s meant for. They cannot pick their own gift. That way we can all enjoy watching that person open it and their reaction. After, we watch the Home Alone or Die Hard movies (my boys pick). While I make dinner. Most of which are my ex-MIL (love her dearly). Ham with pinapple and cherries, baked Mac & cheese, baked beans, mashed poatoes, bacon wrapped asparagus, corn pudding, biscuits. Sometimes I’ll switch a dish or 2.
Watch Christmas Vacation, A Christmas Story, Rudolph the Rednosed Reindeer, Ftosty the Snowman and then turkey on Christmas Day.
Well, ever since I met my late wife (cir. 1986), We, (her and I and our immediate family), has spent Thanksgiving/Christmas with some part of her family–the Inlaws and the Ourlaws. You’d have to know the family dynamics of her extended family to appreciate that description. 😊 Even she had descriptors for some of them. This Thanksgiving, my kiddos and I broke tradition and spent Thanksgiving only with ourselves and their families in the city in which my oldest lives. It looks like Christmas will be the same.
The end of an era has come. But all is good. Change is one of the few constants in life.
@steve Making new traditions 🤗
God I miss rouladen for Christmas Dinner!! I’d forgotten all about them til you mentioned it!! Enjoy them for me x
I was the Christmas 🎄 momma. I would have the boys pick a yard ornament, like an Angel, Grinch, Frosty, Rudolph ( they had to change every year) Loaded the car up, they got to eat in my car , we would go look at lights. We would keep track of all the different items. Whoever had the most got a king size candy bar, the other 3 got regular ( mom might have shared with the winner )
I put glitter and oatmeal and sprinkled in on the snow ❄ to help the reindeer find the believers, hung candy canes on tree after the boys were asleep (🎅) at 05:00 I would ring sleigh bells and jump back in bed and wait for the heard of footsteps 👣 coming flying down the stairs screaming Santa Came! ( I still make sure the canes get hung today)
We did pj day Christmas Day, Backwards day where we ate breakfast for supper, Lunch for breakfast etc. Shirts Backwards all day
A day where everything you ate had to be with a cocktail sword. Movies with a popcorn 🍿 popper on a quilt , no lid , long ropes of licorice sectioning off the boys , any popcorn landing in their sector was theirs to eat. We had a blast. I made pancakes in shapes. Prime rib and shrimp cocktail for supper with mock cocktails ( Rum Runners with no alcohol) in fancy glasses . Homemade hot cocoa. Boys still love the traditions . Fun times. Great memories. 🎅🎁🌲🎅
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