This year for Christmas I was feeling especially nostalgic. I kept thinking about Christmas and the traditions my family had when I was a kid. So, I decided to incorporate a few into our holiday.
I guess having my daughter live so far away and getting to come spend Christmas with us started all this, or maybe it was we just didn't have much money for Christmas this year...who knows, but I told the kids about how my family would open gifts on Christmas eve...even Santa gifts (our stockings) but for Santa to be able to come we (my brother and I) had to leave the house. So my dad would take us driving around to look at the lights on the houses. That is still something I love to do. When we lived in Baker every Sunday night for the month of December we would drive around our little town with our kids and look at the lights. Anyway, here we haven't been driving around looking at lights, but we do see lights at our Festival of lights. Here are few pics...
So, that was tradition number one we did this year.
Next, I kept thinking back to when we would go to my gramma's house for Christmas and she would always have a stocking for us and it always had an orange in the toe. She also had the orange slice candies (the gumdrop ones), nuts, the red peppermint candies, the big gumdrops, and the English licorice sitting in a big bowl on the coffee table. I put oranges in the stockings as well as the candy.
We then had our dinner and just enjoyed being with each other. I say it was a great Christmas...simple, relaxed, and we were all together again.
I guess having my daughter live so far away and getting to come spend Christmas with us started all this, or maybe it was we just didn't have much money for Christmas this year...who knows, but I told the kids about how my family would open gifts on Christmas eve...even Santa gifts (our stockings) but for Santa to be able to come we (my brother and I) had to leave the house. So my dad would take us driving around to look at the lights on the houses. That is still something I love to do. When we lived in Baker every Sunday night for the month of December we would drive around our little town with our kids and look at the lights. Anyway, here we haven't been driving around looking at lights, but we do see lights at our Festival of lights. Here are few pics...
Next, I kept thinking back to when we would go to my gramma's house for Christmas and she would always have a stocking for us and it always had an orange in the toe. She also had the orange slice candies (the gumdrop ones), nuts, the red peppermint candies, the big gumdrops, and the English licorice sitting in a big bowl on the coffee table. I put oranges in the stockings as well as the candy.
We then had our dinner and just enjoyed being with each other. I say it was a great Christmas...simple, relaxed, and we were all together again.
Beth
