When I was a kid we had holiday traditions. We did certain things in certain ways. We had our favorite decorations for the tree, traditional foods and the right time of day for opening presents. (We even had traditional wrapping paper that reappeared, with tape marks, year after year.)
As an adult couple with a dog and no kids we're free from old traditions, but I find myself wanting to establish new ones. I might want to try traveling at Christmas time for example, or making something new.
What are the traditions you can't do without--the ones that create the winter holidays and set you up for the new year?
20 comments:
I could do without the phony Christmas cheer in the workplace...
From the (almost) very bottom of the World down here in Tasmania, I wish you a very Merry Christmas/Yule/Jul/Winter Solstice/Summer Solstice/Amaterasu/Brumalia/ Deygān/Dōngzhì/Hanukkah/Hogmanay/Jonkonnu/Korochun/Kolyada/koleda/Wren day/Lenæa/Meán Geimhridh/Lohri/Midvinterblót/Modranicht/Mummer's Day/Rozhanitsa Feast/Şewy Yelda/Soyalangwul/Ziemassvētki/Āshūrā/Ras as-Sana al-Hijreya or whatever festival you choose to celebrate!
If you’re opting out this year, have a great time in the next few weeks and keep up the good work!
Viewing the photo, my thought was I could also not untangle the lights, retrieved from the storage box. .
Merry and Happy
My aunt sends my mom and I 2 bags of pistachio nuts* every year. This year they were 'late' (arrived 12/20) and were were panicking that she'd forgotten. Funny how something so small would make it seem less Christmas-like.
*my aunt is in Connecticut and orders them online. The company is in Anaheim. We could probably pick them up for less than the shipping cost. lol!
Christmas tree, its decorating and smell of pine. Though these days it is plastic and 1,5' high table version.
Champaign once a year. I almost do not drink at all during the year, and champaign becomes my symbol of New Year celebration.
Feeling of holiday, which is unexplainable. And which some years does not happen and this year I suddenly feel it again.
Family and food; nothing else is very important. Usually we take our grandchildren to the Children's Pageant at a local church. The children recreate and pantomime the biblical story while it's being read by one of the pastors in the choir loft. Very dramatic lighting, candles, and children solemnly playing their roles. Enjoyed by all.
We are also probably the only ones in the neighborhood who burn luminarias.
Next year I want to be in Santa Fe and Taos to watch the Native Americans' ritual ceremony at Taos Pueblo on Christmas eve. That will be the first absence from here during the holidays after many decades!
It's late Christmas Eve here, Petrea, so this is a beautiful way to send me off to bed. And with visions of sugarplums dancing in my head. {They sound pretty, whatever the heck they are.} Merry Christmas to you all.
Well I can tell ya that standing on my feet for 8 hours today trying to keep last minute shoppers smiling isn't one I hope to reinstitute next year!!
LOve your pic !!
Great lights! And if I whip my head around fast, they sparkle. Ok maybe I shouldn't do that. The Christmas tradition that's lasted the longest has been having the 6-foot long gum wrapper chain I made in 6th grade on the tree. And ornaments that my grandfather made. Have a wonderful Christmas Eve!
I like all of these--food, of course, and traditional ornaments. Kris, I'm with you, it's the false stuff that ruins it for some of us, in the workplace, in stores, on the radio, etc.
I've finished all my errands (I hope, oh please please please) and won't be venturing into stores for at least a few days. I like to make contact with whatever salespeople I'm working with, especially these past few days. Folks have been working hard and keeping their cool. I appreciate it and I try to remember to let them know. I worked in a bookstore for a few Christmas seasons and--oh, you don't want to know.
We're decorating our little tree today. I've never done it this late! Perhaps decorating the tree on Christmas Eve day will be our new tradition.
Love your photo! I'm off to Trader Joe's, which has turned into a tradition for me - always last-minute shopping. (I'll be extra nice to the salespeople.) Enjoy your eve!
We have all the old ones, but one thing that we do that is a little special is that my husband makes this fantastic pasta sauce that we serve over thick noodles. I wish you could smell it right now! Also, he makes fantastic fudge. I make cookies, but no one cares. They want the fudge.
Love your photo; it's musical. We have a culturally mixed household, so we do a mix of things; dinner out, dinner with friends. We have a tiny tree with fiber optic lights we put on the fireplace, and we put up the cards we receive as well.
Enjoy tonight and tomorrow and whatever you celebrate! :)
The one tradition that I would love to see again is when all of the big department stores had big display windows on the street with superp Christmas displays. They were a work of art. I know the odd store now has some but its just not the same, Every big store had one back then. Oh no Im dating myself
Merry Christmas Petrea
It's traditional for me not to shop this late in the week, Susan!
Margaret, I'll have cookies and fudge, please.
Ms. M, call me a heathen but "dinner out" always says holiday to me.
Postie, you're taking me back to my childhood! We used to drive in to Chicago from DeKalb to visit Santa and see the windows at Marshall Field's. It was a big deal.
Love the photo Petrea. Who needs that tripod after all!
I'm dreaming/Of a caffeinated Xmas …
Every year, I look for the 12-inch long, 1-inch diameter peppermint sticks that are only available in that narrow span between Thanksgiving and Christmas. I start buying them, 2 or 3 at a time, bring them home to smash with a hammer. Then I savor the shards, a piece at a time, until nothing is left but sugary, pink dust.
I can't be the only one doing this, because the stores' supplies of these canes is exhausted well before Christmas.
And I try to buy one new ornament a year, preferring those that are unusual. Among others, I have a glossy handbag, a Christmas-y red high-heeled pump, Charlie Chaplin, a riverboat, and a string of Holstein cow lights.
Last year, I dressed my pet turtle in felt antlers (meant for a tiny dog), Photoshopped a red nose and Voila! Miss Turtle slowly and methodically delivered presents to children the world over. (It's amazing how little it takes to keep myself entertained.)
Trains. Nothing but trains. As a kid i always set up my Lionel train. Every Hanukah, I would get at least one train car, or sometimes two. The best presents were the first night and the last night. So usually there'd be a good train car on the first night, and maybe the last.
I like to smoke dope and eat Christmas cookies.
Merry Night of Many Mini Lights: Petrea, Bozz and Bernie K
I might pick up some of these traditions and I won't tell which ones.
Merry Christmas, all.
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