71: Christmas Traditions – a celebration of ideas

Christmas traditions can be a very special part of the holiday season. However, since Christmas traditions are often specific to a family, we're often unaware of the great things that families outside of our own are doing to celebrate the holidays. Today we're talking about fun things that other farmish folk families do in honor of the Christmas season. Who knows, you may find something new you'd like to start with your own farmish folk! A very special thanks to all the readers and listeners who answered my quick call out on my Facebook page, my MeWe page, and via my newsletter. Thank you for being willing to share your Christmas traditions! Some of my own Christmas traditions... The funny thing is that sometimes you don't know you're creating Christmas traditions. When the kids were little, my hubby would take one kid and I'd take the other and we'd go Christmas shopping. Then we'd meet for lunch, switch kids, and continue shopping. The boys could shop for their brother and the parent that wasn't with them, and hubby and I could shop for each other. We didn't think we were making a tradition. It was just a time saver. Until December of 2011. We were freak-out deep in moving to the farm—our closing was December 27th—and Hubby and I had taken care of most the shopping early and also online. On a quick shopping trip a couple weeks before Christmas to grab toilet paper and dish soap, our oldest (then 8) asked, "um, aren't we going to do that Christmas Shopping Day thing?" In my haste I told him everything had been taken care of, and we could grab something for Dad/Brother online. My tough 8 year old sat down in Walmart and cried, saying, "but the Christmas shopping day is our tradition!" Y'all there was no time to make the Christmas Shopping Day happen, but we made it happen. I still don't know how we got it to work. But we did it. Because apparently we'd created a tradition without realizing we'd created a tradition. Another of the Christmas traditions we have is to make a birthday cake on Christmas Eve night and sing Happy Birthday to Jesus. This tradition has somehow managed to persist since the kids were little, even though we have differing faith beliefs in our household. Christmas traditions from readers and listeners: "I have several Christmas traditions that we do. One is every since I married my husband 20 years ago, just the two of us take a moonlit and sometimes snowy Christmas Eve walk down our lane in the woods. Another is Christmas morning, after Santa gifts are done, we have a big breakfast of creamed dried beef, toast, hash browns and eggs. When my kids were younger we would watch all the Christmas cartoons and have popcorn while snuggling on the couch, and put milk and cookies out on our special Santa plate for Christmas Eve. There are many more traditions we have but those 3 are out favorite." -- Midge "I get our kids each an new ornament for the tree based on whatever they are interested in that year. We have everything from Disney characters to Scooby Doo—and of course some farm animals—on the tree. I also write the year and which kid so we know years later. This year we laid them all out in order and looked at them before placing on the tree. The kids are 10 and 4 — it was something I started without realizing and they love it!" -- Robyn "A Christmas tradition for me was doing somewhat of a Secret Santa, but for ugly pajamas. Everyone that would be spending Christmas Eve with us would draw names on Thanksgiving and whatever name you got, you tried to find the ugliest pajamas for them to wear on Christmas Eve at our family party. This would be a fun and funny way to spend Christmas Eve. Alas, that tradition isn’t followed anymore by my family as that tradition, as well as the farm, stayed with the ex. Hope you’re well. And Merry Christmas to you and your family." -- Alvin "We put put a piece of straw in an empty manger each time we do a good deed for others to make a ...