My family didn't have a lot of traditions when I was growing up. We had a few, on your birthday you always got one quarter for every year old you were. The birthday person always got to pick dinner too, and my mom would make it (or attempt to make it). I was pretty uncomplicated. I think every year I asked for either Tuna Noodle Casserole or Potatoes Au Gratin with Ham. My brother Alex asked for all kinds of (seemingly) random things like Bouillabaisse. I think Brian asked for spaghetti about 4 years in a row. In the summer we always had "pajama rides" when all the kids would get into their jammies and my dad would drive us out to another town, buy us ice cream and drive around until we fell asleep in the back seat.
For Christmas, we would have a Christmas Eve tradition. On Christmas Eve everyone got to open 3 presents, a book, a pair of pajamas and one present picked from under the tree. (Santa hadn't been there yet and the parents hadn't put out presents, so you had to go with gifts from the extended family.) That is the only thing we did that I would really call a "tradition" but I think in some ways the way that families conduct holidays are sort of a fingerprint of the family. The components are usually there, but everyone does them a little different. Does Santa wrap or deliver out into the open? Does everyone take turns or is it a wrapping paper frenzy with everyone digging in at once? Are presents separated under the tree into piles for each person or is it all jumbled together?
I remember my parents disagreeing about how to handle these things when I was a kid. My mom's family was unwrapped santa presents followed by a free for all. (I can imagine that with 11 kids in the family, unwrapping one at time would take approximately FOREVER.) My dad thought that we should pass the presents around and watch each other open the presents, and also we should wait until after breakfast. (TORTURE!) In the end the came to a sort of compromise, Santa presents were unwrapped and we were allowed to play with them and our stocking offerings as soon as we woke up, but everything else had to wait until after a fairly healthy breakfast. (Which was always at least partially ruined by candy canes, lifesavers and hershey's kisses from the stockings.)
When I got to be a late teen, I added day of baking and a trip to the city for shopping. I had to give them up when A was born, but I that this year she may be old enough for them. When my niece was about A's age, we added a day decorating gingerbread houses with Grandma and a trip for all the women in the family to the Nutcracker. In some ways, I am beginning to think that if I add any more traditions to this holiday, it is going to be more stressful than fun.
C's family added some of their own traditions to the mix. Their family has always done all the Christmas gift opening on Christmas Eve. This is a bit of a double edge sword. There is never a decision to be made about where to spend Christmas. It is just a fact that Christmas Eve is with C's parents, and Christmas Day is with mine. But the addition of a fair influx of presents makes the book and jammies that I give my girl a little less special than it was to me. (And I have completely cut out the picking a presents, because HELLO she already gets a ton.) We also don't do stocking hanging or Santa hot chocolate and cookie leaving, because we stay at the grandparent's house until bed time and she falls asleep en route to the next house.
At some point some of the traditions or the fingerprint of our holidays may change. (I am sure that at some time it would be nice to be in our OWN house for Christmas.) But for now this week holds some days to bake, next weekend is the Nutcracker, and somewhere in the future is a trip on Bart to see Union Square. (Maybe I will take A. ice skating, or maybe not yet.)
I can only hope that this year A. doesn't do what I did the year I was four. I believe that was the year that my brothers and I woke up at 4 AM and discovered that Santa had given me a record player. We Mousersized and Disco Ducked our way through to 6:30 am much to the chagrin of our parents who steadfastly refused to get out of bed, no matter how loud we played the record player and despite the fact that I believe at least one of us kids decided to wake them up by play the "cymbals" (pot lids) in their room. I honestly don't know how we didn't die that Christmas morning.
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