Blogmas 2014 - Day 1 Favorite Christmas Tradition

Hello everyone, welcome to Blogmas 2014!!

I don't know about you, but I am so excited to get this going and to see what everyone will be sharing during the month of December and leading up to the big day.

1st of December, the kick off of our Blogmas 2014.  If you want to join in and are curious about the categories and what exactly this is all about, be sure to read my Blogmas post.

 Since today is the first day, we are kicking it off with our Favorite Christmas Traditions.  These could be something you do as a family, something you did in your childhood, or even something you would love to start doing.

Let's get going......

 

My favorite Christmas traditions.

Growing up, we always celebrated Christmas on the 24th, that was our big day, and the 25th was a day for eating leftovers, enjoying the presents we received and just plain relaxing.  We didn't even do a big dinner or lunch or anything.

As I've grown up and gotten married and started a family, I kept that same tradition but have also incorporated some of our own.

When the kids were little, every Christmas Eve we would make Reindeer Food and then go outside to sprinkle it on the front lawn, that way Santa's Reindeer knew exactly where to stop and also enjoyed a little snack to give them strength to continue on with their very busy night.

We stopped doing that a few years ago because the kids are now 15 and 11 and weren't interested in that anymore.

Another tradition of ours is that every December 1st, we go out and get our tree.  When we lived in Portugal we always had real trees, and my brothers and I looked forward to going to get one and then bringing it into the house and decorating, it was something that stayed with us all these years.

Once we moved to South Africa, it wasn't that easy to find real ones, and so we started using the artificial trees but it just never felt the same to me, and I dreamed about the day I could get a real one again.

The first few years of marriage we used artificial trees too, we couldn't afford to get a real one but again, that dream always remained.

A few years ago, I decided that it was time to switch back to the real one and my dream came true.  Since then, we always get a real tree.  I can't really describe the feeling of seeing it in the living room all decorated and lights blinking, with the wonderful scent of pine wafting through the air.

Another tradition is for me to make either Monkey Bread or Cinnamon Rolls on Christmas morning.

The big night however, like I said above, is Christmas Eve.  I don't make a big dinner, I make a bunch of small things, tons of Portuguese goodies, and we just sit around the table and chat and snack throughout the night.  Once the night is over, I place a big tablecloth over it all and then the next day we just go in there, lift it up and snack all day long.  Love it, it's something we did as children and something we still enjoy to this day.

Since I'm Portuguese and my husband and children are American, we try to do a bit of both.  We open most of the presents on the 24th, but then we also open some on Christmas morning, and the whole stocking thing?  We never had that growing up, but it's something we do now because my husband always had his when he was younger.

Lastly, I actually came in to add this one because it completely slipped my mind earlier, but we have the kids pick an ornament every year for the tree, and by that I mean a new ornament.  My plan is to give them all their ornaments one day when they go off on their own, so that they will have a little piece of home when they decorate their own trees.

So, not too many Christmas traditions, but I think enough to make this season special!

If you have little ones and would like to try the Reindeer Food, I am leaving you the recipe we used below, along with some cute little printables.  Enjoy :)




1/2 cup uncooked oatmeal
1/2 cup sugar
1/4 cup red or green sugar crystals (as used for cake decorating)

Be sure to take this magic food and sprinkle on the lawn,
On Christmas, Santa's reindeer travel miles before the dawn.
The smell of oats and glitter path will guide them on their way
And you'll wake up to Santa's gifts next morn on Christmas Day!



So what are YOUR traditions?

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