Several years ago, I was working as a teacher in a residential treatment center. One of the counselors there told me that the best thing parents can do for their kids is to have decorate for the holidays and develop their own holiday traditions. As my kids have gotten older, I’ve started to realize how much the holidays mean to them, so, even though I would have been happy putting the Christmas Tree up the week before Christmas, we’ve had ours up since Thanksgiving – along with Christmas lights on the house and a large, blow up Christmas Snoopy in the front yard.
We’re starting to create some of our own holiday traditions. Some of our favorites are:
1. Spending Christmas morning snacking on Hickory Farms summer sausage, cheese, crackers, and sliced fruit – We’ve done that for years and it lets us spend a very relaxing Christmas morning together instead of messing with cooking a large breakfast. My kids love making little cracker sandwiches and we all get to enjoy a high protein breakfast that generally tides us over until Christmas dinner.
2. Decorating with Nativity Sets my Kids Can Play With - When we were first married, we had a ceramic nativity set that I set out every year. It made it one year with kids before baby Jesus lost an arm. We haven’t brought it out since. I’m a huge fan of kid-friendly nativity sets because instead of opening box after box of holiday decorations that the kids aren’t allowed to touch, we can pull out a special toy that they can use to help them remember the true meaning of Christmas.
3. Every Family Member Gets One New Christmas Ornament Each Year - My kids really look forward to this tradition. Every year, each person in the family gets their own Christmas ornament. While it’s fun for them to find out which ornament they have gotten each year, it’s even more fun for them to help decorate the tree and pick out the ornaments that belong to them and have special memories for our family.
4. Open One Present Christmas Eve - We started this tradition when I was a child and I remember how much fun it was. On Christmas Eve, we would be allowed to open one present from under the tree. It was usually pajamas but it was so much fun to get the chance to open something the night before and have nice, new pajamas to wake up in on Christmas morning.
What holiday traditions does your family have?
“I wrote this review while participating in a blog tour by Mom Central Consulting on behalf of Hickory Farms and received a two signature gift boxes from Hickory Farms to thank me for taking the time to participate.”
About Rachel
