"If you don't see the real me, you won't see what love has won..." Vota

Thursday, December 17, 2009

Christmas traditions.

Many of my friends are blogging about Christmas traditions. You know those things that you do the same every year and that (hopefully) will be memories for the kids when they are grown. I remember traditions from when I was a kid at Christmas. Our traditions always included going a long way off together as a family to a Christmas tree farm and bring home a live (usually balled) tree. We 3 kids road in the back of the pickup truck under a camper top with the tree. I remember "fighting" boys against girls about how to decorate the tree (Victorian was always my favorite with lace and white lights-- very fancy) and my dopey (heeheehee) brother wanted ugly colored lights and traditional Christmas tree ornaments.We girls outnumbered the boys so we usually won! Smiling at the memory! We always started a week or so before Christmas opening one gift each night and then on Christmas Eve we would open a few. We still had tons of gifts to open on Christmas morning. I remember waking mamma and daddy up at extremely early hours on Christmas day to open presents. We wouldn't even get dressed first; we just wore our pj's. Then we would watch the parade and eat sugar and M&M cookies...  I also remember calling my "BFF's", Kara & Patty, every Christmas to tell them and hear from them all the Christmas gifts we received. It was a ritual. We always called each other and then walked to each other’s house (we lived in each other's back/front yards) to share our new stuff. Christmas was always such a fun time. I want my girls to be able to look back on their Christmases with as much fondness as I do.


Hubby had his own traditions which he still loves to talk about and remembers with just as much fondness as I. He remembers the times the family would go looking at Christmas lights on Christmas Eve and his dad always happened to leave something in the house or mom would and then would take forever to retrieve it. Magically when they would return home, "Santa" would have come and they would open their gifts on Christmas Eve so they could go to his grannies house on Christmas Day. One Christmas Eve he was so upset because they were at his Gran Mattie's house instead of at home and he was so worried that Santa wouldn't find him. He remembers waking up to find a train running around the tree. He remembers having coffee cake/monkey bread on Christmas Day.

We have started some of our own traditions. Things like, I always decorate November 1st (or sooner much to his chagrin). We always have some sort of advent calendar which starts no later than December 1st. The girls always get to open 1 present on Christmas Eve which just so happens to be a new pair of pj's to sleep in that night and open presents in the next morning. We always wake up, look at the presents under the tree, open our stockings and then eat a big breakfast which always includes oatmeal pancakes (a recipe we found when I was pregnant with Ollie and it is so yummy-- want the recipe? I'll share it if you ask.), eggs, bacon, and sausage. Usually Hubby is the one who cooks it too! After breakfast we open our presents one at a time so everyone can see what each other has opened. We always read the Christmas story from Luke and talk about the real meaning of our joy and celebration. We then eat our favorite snack foods as we are hungry for the rest of the day. Things we don't get to eat very often and take no time really to prepare-- this way no one is tied up in the kitchen all afternoon cooking a big fancy meal. This year Ollie requested crackers, carrot sticks, nuts and fruit. These things are regular foods for her, so I am also going to make a goat cheese ball to go with her crackers, hummus to go with her carrots, and a coconut milk based "yogurt" dip for her fruit. I am also going to make a praline nut cluster mix with cereal squares and pretzles. The turkey could care less about what; she collects it all on her plate so she has no requests. Hubby requested sausage balls, and I am going to make a new recipe I found online at Land O'Lakes recipe site for a stuffed Italian sandwich type thing. It sounded really good. I'll make it all the day before and just heat it all up or bake it as needed on Christmas day and wallah!

*Oh, I forgot (no wonder) one thing we did every Christmas as kids. My dopey brother again-- He loved the movie "A Christmas Story" (1983) and it was always on as a marathon on Christmas day. I mean MAR-A-THON, all day long, over and over "I want an Official Red Ryder Carbine-Action Two-Hundred-Shot Range Model Air Rifle!", "You'll shoot you eye out", "you Bumpasses", "Fa ra ra ra ra, ra ra ra ra", "Ho, ho, ho" from evil Santa, "Oh fuuudge", "Ovaltine? A crummy commercial?", and a million other horrible lines impaled in my memory because somehow my brother always won the remote battle when it came to this movie (or the 3 Stooges for that matter). Now, I am married to a man who loves this movie as much as Tim. It has got to be a guy thing?? That leg lamp alone-- "Only one thing in the world could've dragged me away from the soft glow of electric sex gleaming in the window."-- would have to imply this movie is a guy’s movie... I guess it was only fair to sit and watch this movie in front of our girlie Christmas tree! :)

7 comments:

  1. it may be a guy movie, but my mom-in-law loves it. from th minute the marathon starts, her tv is on and playing it.

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  2. it is still the best christmas movie ever made-tim

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