Family Tradition

[Bessie]

Do you all have any special Family Traditions that always bring a smile to your face or that brings back great memories? If not, why not start some this year. It is a wonderful thing to share with your loved ones. Here are a few of mine:

Every year at Thanksgiving we all hold hands, pray, :pray: and then everyone tells what they are thankful for. It really touches your heart to hear your loved ones say that they are thankful for each other.

At Christmas I always make Ritz Cracker Pops and they have to have the sprinkles on them :)

On Christmas Eve we are allowed to open one gift.

Every baby born into the family has to have the Fisher-Price Stack & Roll toy.

We eat the traditional turkey meal at Thanksgiving but for Christmas we have a Mexican Fiesta complete with homemade tamales.

We always watch "How The Grinch Stole Christmas" and "It's A Wonderful Life" every Christmas season.

I can't wait to read everyone else's traditions :hi:

[charmedx3]

I Can Only Think Of A Few::
Christmas Eve We Get Together With Family And Exchange Gifts For The Kids Only
Christmas Morning We Get Up Early And Open Gifts.......how Early? One Year It Was 230am!!! We Now Try To Keep It At 5am!!

St Patricks We Get Together For Another Family Dinner--it Feels Like Christmas/thanksgiving With The Amount Of Food We Get!

[momof3britts]

easter the kids put out empty baskets for the bunny to fill while they sleep, even dad puts one out.

easter eggs are always hide with money or scatch off lottery tickets in them.

Every baby born gets a silk and fleece blanket from me because my kids loved there so much that I order the same one for every baby.

Every new pet gets to stop by the pet store on our way home to pick out all its new things for its self. No sharing here.

[mary124]

Most Christmases we have 2-- as my family lives in Houston and we live in Austin and during the holidays my husband and 2 son's work and its hard for them to get off- but gifts are strickly for the little ones when we are with family, but on the actual day of course, there are plenty for everyone- we don't get up early (or near as early as we use to) I think its around 7:00 now. We even have gifts for our little one (Emzy- she is about 3 years old and is a Jack Russell Terrier/whippet (small greyhound) - sometimes I think she has more under the tree than I do!!
On Easter we just color eggs now for our friends little ones but we have a few extra for here at the house for Emzy to hunt them down. She also gets a gift on this day, as well as her birthday when we give her a can of "wet" food and put a little candle on it. (Crazy, I know, but she is our baby!!)

[SharonA]

This tradition will make sense if you have seen the movie "A Christmas Story".

Since our son lives hundreds of miles from us, we are not always together on Christmas. If that is the case...Hubby and I go to a Chinese Restaurant on Christmas Day. :D

[Claredale]

What a nice idea for a thread.

My sons are grown and out of the house now, but when my son's turned 2 and began to understand surprises, I copied an idea that one of my friend's moms did for her family. They had birthday months. I would give them an inexpensive gift everyday during the month of their birthday. They never knew when it would show up. Sometimes it was in their cereal bowl or sometimes a friend would give it to them at school, or it would show up at dinner time. I got really creative some years! It was normally something from the dollar store or even a roll of pennies (that was when they were young!), but it was fun watching their anticipation of when their birthday month came around. I did this until they turned 18. They still think I should continue the tradition, but it's kind of hard now that they live in other cities.

For the holidays, I always have their Christmas stocking with their favorite candies, a few goofy things like toothpaste and floss. Whatever I happen to gather up and always a calendar. Now that I have a DIL added to the family, she also gets her Christmas stocking. It's much more fun to buy girlie things!

We also ALWAYS watch Christmas Vacation. When my son got married last year, I gave him and his new wife their own DVD of the movie.

T83

[SharonA]

My son's step mother gives him a calendar every year for Christmas with all the important family dates marked and why they are important. I like that idea. I wish I had thought of doing it. :lmao:

[BrittanysDance]

Oh..what a great thread Bessie! I was gone so I missed it!

Okay - lets see.....

Birthdays: We always decorate while the "Birthday person" is sleeping so they wake up to a decorated house. :) We also wake them up by throwing confetti on them and jumping on the bed singing Happy Birthday at a God forsaken time in the morning LOL! Icing on the nose at an unsuspecting moment is another thing that happens, you dont know when, but you know it WILL happen in the 24 hours its your "day"!

Easter: The Easter Bunny leaves baskets outside in the trees or yard, sometimes in the house (if raining). Video camera running, you have to find your basket. We dye eggs the night before in the "old style", complete with a white crayon to make different decorations and marks on the eggs. We hide a gazzillion plastic eggs with candy and money in them for the kids first, then the kids hide them for the adults (empty by then). We always end it with a live egg toss - gets really messy but fun.

Halloween: Oh what fun! We always go to a pumpkin patch and have done so since our daughter (the eldest) was a baby. The rule is if you can carry it, you can buy it. If you cant carry it, you cant have it! :D You must be able to carry it all the way to the register or its no deal! The hayrides, horserides and rope swings are the best! Corn mazes and chasing chickens...ahh... I love halloween the best I think. So much fun!

Thanksgiving: Traditional Turkey Day. Turkey with all the fixin's. We switch off on who's house to go to and who comes down *or up* from what state. Last year, we had everyone here from hubby's family so it was nice, 3 different states and a house full. Great time!

Christmas: Ahhh...Christmas! We always go and select a tree at a farm - sometimes its a tractor ride out to the trees, sometimes its walking acres and acres of trees until you find just the right one to cut down! It's the smell of all those trees and the cold of the day that gets you in the mood for hot chocolate...YUM! As we warm up with chocolate, we wrap the tree and head back home where we put on Christmas carols and start to decorate the tree. Its a day filled with singing and decorating. Christmas eve we all get to open 1 present; We read The Night Before Christmas every year, watch The Grinch, Rudolph, Frosty, and It's a Wonderful Life (so many years I've lost count!), we track Santa on NORAD, get milk and cookies and when he gets to the US - the kids (yes even the eldest at nearly 18..) runs to bed. Hubby and I fill up the stockings and hang them by the chimneys, complete with all the presents from "Santa". On Christmas Day the kids all come running downstairs as we video tape them, in search of their stockings to see what Santa left (and the 2 youngest still believe in Santa), then we go to the sunrise service at church, after that we come back and have breakfast at the house and open all the presents :).

Ahhh... what a great thread Bessie.... so many wonderful traditions everyone has! It's nice to read everyone's.

[leelee88]

Great idea for a thread Bessie!! Holiday season is just around the corner:smile tee

For Christmas we have always opened one gift on Christmas Eve. And since I have married Dom and moved into a larger family we all get together at my house for dirty santa where we all steal each others gifts.. Bunches of fun!

Birthdays I always make them the cake of thier choice.

Hey Brit your house sounds like a blast during holiday season!! Think we might come join ya..lol

[BrittanysDance]

Sure - C'mon over LOL!

Oh..I just thought of another tradition - one I started for my daughter last year which in turn, began for her friends. For her birthday I knew the kids (her friends) didnt have alot of money to spend on presents (who does?!) so I came up with the idea that they couldnt spend more than $5.00 and that they had to go to the Dollar Store and pick items there. In that task, each item they picked had to be something that reminded them about my daughter, i.e., her personality, why they were friends, etc. and along with each "gift" they had to have a little card that explained what each one meant. So one girl got some bubbles because my daughter had a "bubbly personality", another got some band-aids because my daughter was "always willing to fix the mistakes that would happen in their friendship". It was a really neat thing to do and the girls loved it so much they decided to do it for their birthday parties that soon followed! :)

Oooh..dirty santa sounds like fun! and Tracey - I LOVE the idea of the "birthday month" - that sounds so very neat and like something my kids would love!

[Claredale]

Yes, the birthday month was always so much fun. My older son and wife are coming in town on Friday and August is my birthday month. I texted a message (Only took me 15 minutes to type 2 sentences! LOL) to my son that I thought it would really be nice if he would have gifts for me the 4 days he is here. So far...no reply!

I don't know if this is a tradition but it was fun to do at Christmas. I was such a snoop when I was growing up. I knew what was in every one of my packages before Christmas. I remember getting a Carpenters record (can you guess how old I am!) one year and I opened it every day during Christmas break and listened to it and would wrap it back up. I was even known to wear an outfit to school and it would be wrapped and under the tree before my mom got home from work. My parents never knew this until I told them after I was married. So you will get the jist of why I started this little game.

My younger son let it slip one year when he was about 8 or so that he had unwrapped one of his gifts. The next year I wrapped all their gifts in the tissue paper that you normally put inside the gift and would think of 8 or 10 different names. One year I used Looney Toons names, another year I did the Disney names, etc. I would use 3 or 4 different names so they couldn't figure out the "code", even hubby had a code name. I kept the code at work, so they couldn't find it. That was always alot of fun. They couldn't believe I did that. I told them they were messin with the master! Hubby kept my presents at his mom's house. One year I wanted a Thomas Kincaid picture. Any one of his Christmas scenes, I would be happy. I truly didn't snoop, plus we normally don't give each other "big" gifts. But to be funny, I went to the Thomas Kincade store in the mall and got a postcard and I taped it on the wall on Christmas Eve. I even said that would be the only way I would have that picture. The next morning when we got up, he had bought me that exact picture and had it hanging where I had taped the postcard. Thomas Kincade had at least 4 Christmas scene pictures, so I was amazed that it was the same one. He still insists to this day that I snooped, but I really didn't.

[mary124]

I was thinking here (bad sign!-LOL) when my son's had their birthday (they are grown now- too bad), my husband has a sense of humor and he would decorate the kitchen in whatever--some years it was Disney characters; Scooby Doo; Toy Story, etc. and we invited a few friends of theirs who knew about this. My son's of course by the time they were in the teen years were embarrassed by this, but their friends thought it was great!

[BrittanysDance]

ooooh Tracey, you're bad! You're lucky you didnt find coal in your stocking! :D

You just made me think of the first time I found out Santa wasnt real *pouts* :( I was 5 years old (yeah, talk about a bummer!) - I remember being in my room and in bed, it was Chirstmas Eve and I was SO excited, I had asked for an Easy Bake Oven and a Snoopy Snow Cone Machine. Well..I couldnt sleep and of course, I was listening for "reindeer hoofs and Santa" - and I gasped! I heard him!! He was in the living room! OMG I was SOOO Excited! I didnt even wake my siblings (I'm the baby, you think I'm gonna share that with THEM?! LOL! They're older..too bad sucks to be you guys - I'm gonna meet the "Big Man Himself!") HA HA!:biglaugh: So I crept down the hallway in my pjs with the little plastic feeties (you know the ones...:D) and peek around the corner to the living room - and what do I find?!! MY PARENTS wrapping MY Snoopy Snow Cone Machine and Easy Bake Oven!!!! I was horrified! I popped out so fast and yelled something - I cant recall exactly what but I know they both gasped when they saw me. I felt like the littlest Who from Whoville and the Grinches were standing there stealing all the presents! :tsk: They didnt quite know what to say but I asked where was Santa - and at the time, I guess they didnt think to say what I tell my kids (that I'm Santas Helper :smile tee *and that was the exact reason I say this to my kids now*) and they blew it for me. :(

But..I loved my Snow Cone Machine and my Easy Bake Oven...and as an added surprise - I got my first portable 8 track tape player! LMAO

Now....lets show our age together shall we? :smile tee

Thank God they didnt blow the ToothFairy until much later - that would have devastated me even more! LOL

[Claredale]

I remember seeing a Sears price tag on of my doll house box. I was in 4th grade, so I was was pretty old. My mom tried to say that Santa ran out of toys, but I didn't fall for it!

When my older son lost his first tooth, which was right before he went to bed, he was so excited about the tooth fairy visiting. He wanted to make sure I called to let her know since it was already getting late. When my husband and I were getting the money to put under his pillow, all I had was a twenty dollar bill. I wasn't about to give the kid $20.00 as excited as I was for him, he would have started pulling out his teeth himself. My husband had to go to my neighbors house to get change. They still tease my husband that he was paying for sex and needed change. I informed them that I took credit cards! LOL!