Perhaps it's because of the things I used to do, and my family did, that we no longer do make it seem less Christmas-y. This year I had some plans to do Christmas activities and events but they never worked out, so I thought it might be good to atleast write about some of my family's Christmas traditions XD
Cookies!
I think this is very common holiday activity, but it is something very rewarding haha, you get to make something with your own hands and then eat it! I remember making Christmas cookies with my Grandma every year when I was young. We would make little wreaths made out of corn flakes and green colored marshmallow (like rice crispies).
The photo above was taken on Christmas 2008, some of the cookies were given to us, but most were made by my mom! Oh and there also some bars and fudge. I can't look at it any more, hungry!
The Christmas Toy
img via Muppet Wiki
The Christmas Toy is a Jim Henson, creator of the Muppets, one hour Christmas special which came out in 1986. Kermit is in it a little bit, but it's basically about toys who are alive, and one thinks he is supposed to be his owner's Christmas gift again.
Well I used to always watch this at Christmas time when I was a kid, and recently I have been watching it again. Not this year, but the past couple of years we just watch it some evening in December^^
Department 56's Dicken's Village
Another tradition we had was to display our village collection from Department 56, we had the Dicken's Village which were lighted houses, scenery, and figures modeled after the Victorian period in England. Every year we would put the houses out on a sheet of fake snow with hand carved "hills" on the entertainment system.
Well we got rid of the entertainment system cabinent, so there was no place to assemble the village and the tradition died out. But my mom recently bought a new bookcase which may work so next year hopefully we can put the village out again!
Another Christmas tradition we had was I was allowed to open one gift on Christmas Eve rather than Christmas Day. On Christmas Eve I used to go to my paternal Grandparent's house to exchange gifts, visit and have a nice dinner. When I got home I would show my mom all the gifts I got and tell her about the evening, then I got to pick a small gift from her to open.
That was always very fun and exciting, my mom always got me the cutest toys I wanted, and it just made the wait for Christmas morning harder haha!
This may sound like an odd tradition, but in the past me and my mom would just relax on Christmas day. We didn't have family come over (we always went to visit them), so we didn't cook a meal or have a party. We would just open our gifts and enjoy the free day.
Now my dad and maternal Grandma come over on Christmas day so we quickly have to unwrap gifts and get them out of the way so we can start cooking dinner. The photo above was some of the food we bought and had to prepare (all that for 4 people yes) You can read about that in this old post.
Wow this post took me so much longer to write than I expected! I didn't think it would be difficult to write about things that are personal, but each sentence took forever to form haha! I still have some things to finish before Christmas, but I work the next two days (yeah on Christmas Eve TT) so I have to manage my time well!
Well just to make this post more fun, here's a picture of my cat Micky from Christmas 2009, with a Christmas candy wrapper on his head as a hat:
I guess he's sticking his tongue out at the hat haha
