Holiday Traditions
 

This year will be my first year "hosting" Christmas at home. The past seven years we've spent Christmas with my in-laws, and all of the good Christmases before that were at my grandmother's, who passed away several years ago. (The Bad Christmases are another story all together, but that's for another thread.)

It's also my first year as a mom, and although Beans will only be 4 months old at Christmas and will be more than content to bat at ornaments and stare at the shiny lights, I'm hoping to start putting down the roots of having our own family traditions that will grow with us as our daughter grows.

One tradition Kitsune and I have started is that each year, we've bought a new ornament for our tree to represent something that's happened. We have ornaments celebrating our marriage, our new house, the birth of our daughter, and even the adoption of each of our dogs. (Except I haven't had time to dig up a picture of Pepper, so for right now it looks like we are commemorating some exceptionally good looking Golden Retriever.)

Whether you're celebrating Christmas, Hanukkah, Yule, Festivus, or anything else... what traditions does your family have this time of year?

Either this weekend or next we'll buy a real Christmas tree, because they are fresher now and the selection is better. But we don't put it up until it gets closer to Christmas. Instead, we'll put it in a bucket of water in the back yard to try to keep it fresh. We'll decorateit together as a family with some nice music and cheese and crackers or something like that. The ornaments all have a story. That part is pretty cool.

The only traditions we have are food ones. Fish chowder on Christmas Eve and crab imperial on Christmas day. Yum!

We're probably looking at some adjustment in our holiday patterns as the boyfriend of my eldest is still hanging around. :cool:

Mr Limey and I have an advent calendar each, the sort with pockets, and each year at the end of November we indulgently buy 48 of the filled chocolates from our local chocolate shop to fill the pockets.
Then we eat one a day til Christmas!

Interesting shop... I've never heard of "Spanish Drinking Chocolate". :confused:
They apparently don't ship to the USA.

I think its one step from hot chocolate. The Spanish sweetened the traditional South American cocoa drink.

It's in bar form, maybe you break off a piece and drop it in your drink.
If so, it would probably have to be a hot drink.

Edit: Just got an email from a friend in Canada saying they stir a piece into warm milk, and it's very rich.

The "December" cd by George Winston. As many luminarios as humanly possible on both the solstice and Christmas Eve. Star Christmas lights. I buy more strings of star lights each year with the goal of one day having as many of my own stars as the ones in the night sky. Of course, the resulting electric bill might prove a tad expensive, but I'll worry about that when I achieve my goal around Christmas 5012.

2012 marks 50 years of raising and selling Christmas trees. We have folks now coming with their grandkids (!!??) that came with their parents as children. I think I like being out there with the people, watching the kids run around, more than the actual holiday itself.

When my kids were growing up we always set an extra place at the table on Christmas Eve (a Ukrainian/Russian tradition), both to be ready to offer dinner to anyone needing it, and to honor/remember relatives no longer with us. We used to do the 12-dish traditional Ukrainian Christmas Eve meal but the kids aren't into it so much anymore. This year it won't be practical anyway. I used to love doing it, though.

I think that's one of the nicest traditions, for Christmas or any other special time.

I agree with Lamplighter. This sounds absolutely wonderful!

That sounds like it could be fun if the weather cooperates. Cold is fine, 3 feet of snow, not so much. :D

An extra plate is great. Load it up with goodies and if nobody shows up, it's mine. Mine, you hear me, all mine. Muhahahahaha.

Okay, you have dibs. ;)

My favourite tradition is our massive family party on Christmas night. I've talked about it before (probably mention it here at least once every christmas). There's more than 80 there usually these days. It's getting big.

I love it. Always the best party of the year for me. Nothing else compares. Nothing even comes close.

80 all relatives?

Yeah. in laws and out laws included of course. :)

I don't think I even know 80 people!

ortho, the empty place setting does seem like a wonderful tradition. I've heard of people doing that for a Halloween/Day of the Dead meal, to honor friends and family that have passed on, but never for Christmas. What are the 12 dishes in the Ukrainian meal?

Ortho- did you ever hear about that time an old, old man came into dinner to fill the empty place? The family got all silent and gave him dinner but they were freaked because it was the husband's DEAD FATHER who had come to dine.

That's a Romanian story about vampires.

We air grievances and practice feats of strength, natch.

Interesting.

We err grievances and practice feets of strength.

footfootfoot comes to your place for the holidays?

we never do anything consistently. Ever. We rarely celebrate the way other families do (my father's Scottish miserliness) when my sister got her Master's degree-nothing. Oh, well, I do think they paid to have her diploma framed. Whup.


One year at Christmas we had tacos for dinner. My younger boy was STUNNED. "I thought you were JOKING when you said that!"


Me? Now I'm all alone-I light candles and incense and decorate beyond what I should as who the hell comes to see me, right? But I like to honor the seasons. I have a deer and cardinal theme going now. In spring it changes, natch. I think I"ve got the whole wheel pretty much covered.

:ivy:

Hello again there nowhere man!

Y'all sound like you have great traditions.
We're not big on them in my family.
My sister established her own as soon as she met Gary and she's dictated times and dates ever since.
Ste & E almost always come over on Christmas Eve - she's an only child so I understand that her parents get dibs on what they do. And we'll have salmon en coute and a prawn ring mostly for her benefit.

Now all the older generation has gone it's just me, Mum & Dad on the day. No Christmas tree ("too much mess and bother and I'm the one who has to hoover it up!" sez Mum) And no cooking because it's not worth all the fuss just for us. Well, she did it for years and she's 66 now so I suppose I can't blame her. We're off to the pub like last year. I tried to bow out but she was so upset I didn't have the heart. I'll barely make it through the starter at this rate. MUST remember plastic boxes!

My Christmas traditions are in the Cellar.
No Secret Santa this year, but giving and receiving cards.
Meeting up with Dani and Limey for the panto and going out for dinner.
Photos and laughs and JB and friendship.

I don't even like most Christmas food.
But I miss the feeling of belonging that only comes from in-jokes and traditions.

See? you and me really ARE related Sundae! both our families could give a fuck for tradition. I think we have ONE that might, might still remain: my mom gives my BIL a sweatshirt, EVERY year, for christmas.

She gives the rest of her brood 100.00. I've already spent mine.

Twice over.

You're not of secret gypsy ancestry are you? ;)

Actually, I can see this. At Thanksgiving, there were 32 of us and only my cousins had kids, 2 each. On our side, all single, and that's not counting some of my other siblings who didn't come. Now, imagine if EVERYBODY comes, aunts, uncles, cousins with their significant other with kids, siblings and spouse, and nieces and nephews, and ... grandkids, etc. Come to think of it, 80 is not too big of a number, hehe.

If I'm not mistaken, I believe it's three days per hundred pounds field dressed weight.
How long has he been hanging? Be sure to keep the temp below 40.

Damn, he's gotta be bad by now.

Q for the Aussies: How do you decorate for the holidays? I was laughing at the incongruity of seeing inflatable snow men on our very green front yards, but it is still technically winter for all that it's 80F outside. I imagine snowflakes don't really make sense at all when it's summer.

;)

They drink white wine in the sun! And see their granddad and mum!

My Uncle, Aunt & cousin are too old for the beach now, but they used to do it when they were younger. Well I mean Jimmy and Glenys can't be arsed and Hannah is too cool to be making a big deal of Chrimbo with the 'rents.

Jim always phones Christmas Day, speaks to all of us. It used to be an even longer call. It's our second Christmas without Grandad but somehow, with him gone, it makes losing Auntie Alice, and even Nanny seem so much more significant. We are all there is.

Sadness.

It's vain to wish I had settled and carried on my own traditions (we had started them after all) because I was unhappy and I was making him unhappy. And I have almost no regrets about leaving him. But the times we shared were precious and our four Christmases, surrounded by friends, were wonderful. I worked hard to make sure it was so and I was rewarded. But then that's why I agreed to marry him - the lifestyle. It wasn't money - I earned more than him. It was security, community and safety.

Shit.

S'okay Sundae Woman.

The man I sometimes wish I hadn't let go of (bachelor number one) bought me a beautiful leather coat for Christmas one year...and it's funny, but it fit HIM perfectly. Was a bit too large for me. Isn't that a clue to something else? Whenever I feel like I 'shoulda/coulda/woulda' stayed with him I think of his controlling behavior and his incredible selfishness. He was a white-hot blonde Leo. The only blonde and the only Leo I ever dated. Gold? He shone like the sun. Shine on you crazy diamond....well,now I'm just being silly!


I honor the seasons. I suspect you do, too. That's a tradition, girlie. A good one, too.

You're a ruby, yes? July, Yes? Crab? or are you June? I've forgotten! Please let me know.

I'm cancer. I'll suck the marrow from your bones.
Sneaked out on the 1st of July. Late. Been catching up ever since.

I respect your beliefs because I love you, but I do have to say I think astrology is a pile of shit. But you're right that I honour the seasons in my own way. My real traditions revolve around them without being tied to anything organised.

Philip Larkin would have his religion based on water. Water's too cold for me. I'll take squirells I think. Hot blood in a muff.

Still, do you have a ruby necklace going spare...?

yeah, I looked up your stats and you ARE a ruby.
Remember Ruby Lennox - she was a precious jewel, a drop of blood.

eta: and you're a water sign. We gets along, we do.

eagainta: what's Philip Larkin doing worshiping water? I thought he only worshiped himself.

No. You'll serve your LOVERS bones in brine.

Me, too.

It's our heritage.

Not that I know of, but it's possible. Most of the family seems to have the travel bug. Who knows. :)

We put up fake trees over here and some spray their windows with fake frost etc. Blow up snowmen and santas and heaps of christmas light displays just like everywhere else I guess. The only difference is that after lunch we get the slip and slide out for the kids instead of hot chocolate by the fire.

[quote=Sundae;842609]Hello again there nowhere man!

Hi there Sundae !!
Just popped in to see what condition that the Cellar was in ......

well, just so long as your girlfriend isn't passed out on the floor you should be ok (Mama told me not to come!)

:lol:

This deserved much more attention. :p:

I appreciate your attention. I can always count on you, albeit only to ten.