Christmas Traditions

I think traditions are important--even silly little things like a certain dessert or a visit to a relative's house each year.  My parents raised us kids with a million traditions throughout the year.  Looking back, I wonder if there were things that my mom wished would become traditions, but we had snarky attitudes about it or weren't as excited as she hoped, so they didn't continue.  Mom, I remember decorating wrapping paper one year, did we do that more than once?  We also made ornaments to go along with family Christmas gifts each year for a long time, but I don't remember if that continued when we were in high school...do you still do that?  What about Bunco?  I know you thought it would be a great game, and we were definitely not good sports about that. (I still don't understand why people like that game...)

Even if there were some would-be traditions that flopped, there are still tons that we loved and I know we will continue them with our kids.  We have the Thanksgiving Pinata, junk food on Christmas Eve, and finding a way to be involved in Mass during every holiday season.  Here are a few pics of new traditions that I didn't get from my parents, but Curly seems to enjoy so far this year.

Opening Christmas ornaments: Scott's parents got him an ornament each year that matched the activity or TV show that he loved.  We've gotten Curly ornaments for Little Hungry Caterpillar, Green Eggs and Ham, and Elmo.

Here are Curly and Scott with this year's ornaments.  The small tree behind them shows off all the ornaments from Scott's childhood...Taz, the Simpsons, basketball, and hockey.

We tried gingerbread houses this year!  It doesn't look much like a house, but she had fun eating the frosting and candy!

I only remember visiting Santa once as a kid, so if we went every year, I guess he didn't make much of an impact.  Curly was nervous, but still thought Santa was pretty awesome.