What are your family Christmas traditions

Did your family have Christmas traditions while growing up? What were they? Do you still keep those traditions?

I still live with my parents, so enough traditions all around. The most important one is Christmas eve, which is for the three of us only. There's no TV and no computer on in the house then. We play Christmas songs on the radio all evening long and put all the presents under the tree before we go eat. Dinner by candlelight with pancakes on my plate. Delicious! We spend the evening unwrapping gifts, admiring what we received and eating lots of yummy Christmas treats. It's a relaxed evening full of joy and gratefulness for being together as a family. I can see myself do the exact same thing with my own family someday.

The other tradition is a religious one. When I was little, I used to play with all the figurines in the stable. Even now, I am the one who takes them out of their box and unwraps them. I still place them in the landscape my Dad creates around the stable under the tree. On Christmas eve, I unwrap little Jesus and place him in his crib. Dad and I usually visit church the day after that while Mum prepares our Christmas dinner. (She can't join us in church, unfortunately, because she suffers from an illness that disrupts her balance and causes vertigo.) I may no longer be a Christian in the strictest sense of the word, but I adhere to the religious tradition of my family and their ancestors on days like these. That process of honouring my ancestors is one of the many things I still believe in and will do until my dying day.

on xmas morning when we were kids & even when i grew up & spent xmas at my parents with my kids, my mamma used to get us all up at about 5am by coming our room & singing hymns at the top of her voice!
then we would all go downstairs & sit in a circle on the floor while mamma passed the presents around. this i still do now.
but sadly, this year we are not celebrating xmas so much as mamma died a few months ago so it just won't feel the same without her shenanigans!!!

[SeaZen]

I loved my eastern orthodox churches christmas eve traditions and still participate in them. During the x-mas eve church service (which consisted of chanting and singing, no preaching) the priest would toss wheat grains and walnuts into crowd. Not sure of the meaning behind that.

At the end of the service, we would go outside on the church grounds and he would bless a tree that had been cut and pass out twigs with leaves on them for the parishioners to bring back to their house. We would then light up the remains of the tree for a bonfire. We would then go inside the church hall for a communal feast. They would make and serve a traditional drink for the adults. Its called tea of sumadiya (a region of serbia). It is serbian plum brandy boiled with a little water and sugar and served up in a tea glass.

[Lynn]

Hello


Hmmmm looking back to childhood traditions. Making those paper ring loops and filling the house with them. " what a waste of trees" I now think. Back then there was no recycling.

I remember getting our first artifical tree and getting that FAKE tree smell spray.

Dinner traditions were Turkey and running around to OVER eat at this Grandma and that Gradma and then having to have faimily dinner.

Good childhood memories not really good nor bad.

Now that traditons for me family are deck the outside of the house. Do some simple decorations and tree inside the house. MOST of all though making sure that me kids know how blessed they are to have a SOLID home foundation and that not all have that. So we give back and they are a part of that.

Lynn

[Lightspirit]

one tradition our family always has- parents being difficult, sister annoying complaining about parent- it wouldn't be christmas without that. I try to go camping to get away from it all he he

[wkiehl101]

our family has not had any Christmas traditions for years. When I was living on my own (completely) for the first time back in my home state, I celebrated my own Christmas, and bought new ornaments for my then dysfunctional Martha Stewart tree (most of my old ornaments were for a big tree; the one I had then was a tabletop) and after that I decided that I would buy at least one new ornament a year (turned out to be more than that). I have not yet bought one for this year, though. And I haven't had a tree since 2004 (vowed I wouldn't get one until I was both on my own again and settled at the same time). We still do some version of the Christmas dinner though.

[Lynn]

Hello


From the day the kids were born I have gotten them an ornament for the tree. Too not always one tha is dated as those tend to be rather commercial in nature. Somethng that is "them" in some way.

The idea behind this is that when they move from home those go with them for their first tree. So say at 18 (Wishful thinking ) they move out....they will have 18 ornmaments to take with them. NICE one's too as they have a personal touch. Hold many memories.

That is a small traditon I started . I have kids 12 and 10 and 8 so the tree is rather FULL.

Lynn

Part of the tradition was lies.
The lie about santa (anagram for satan) coming to bring gifts.
I asked my mom at age 5-7 to come clean about this, telling her i knew she was lying and that it hurt trust between us.

Originally Posted by Shim

Did your family have Christmas traditions while growing up?

When I was a child back in the early 1960s, my great-grandmother's nine kids, along with their spouses and children, would all get together and exchange gifts on Christmas eve. We're talking 90-100 adults and kids, crammed into my great-aunt's home.

When my great-grandmother died, that all stopped. Her daughter -- my grandmother -- would come over to our home on Christmas, along with a few other relatives. But it was never the same. I never saw 90% of those relatives from back in the 60s, ever again after that.

Somewhat sad story, but that's our "progressive" society for you.