Tradition! Tradition!

For some reason this Christmas I worried a lot about traditions (extra credit to anyone who heard Tevye's voice singing).  Does our family have enough traditions?  Will my children have good memories of Christmas traditions?  I sat and made a mental list of our traditions and they all seemed so generic and, well, lame.  I tried to come up with new traditions that I could start in our family but I didn't get very far!  

Despite our lack of creative, long lasting traditions, we had a merry Christmas. Our first tradition was decorating our house and Christmas tree.  The girls were a big help and as a result of all their helpfulness we lost a great many ornaments.

This year we not only decorated our own Christmas tree, we also went over and helped Tata decorate his tree.

Our next tradition was putting lights up on our house.  Lillian was a big help and kept wanting to put up more and more!

For the second year in a row our family participated in the Light the World campaign through The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.  Each day we read a scripture and watched a video highlighting one of the ways Jesus Christ lit the world.  We then chose an activity we could do to help light the world as He did.  This particular evening the girls and I made cookies to give to our neighbors.  I found following along with this program helped us all better remember the true meaning of Christmas.

We also decorated not one but two gingerbread houses.  The first house we decorated with friends. 

 The second we decorated with Grandma Jean and Papa.  The girls love this tradition.  We always have such a delightful evening eating dinner and creating the most beautiful house imaginable.  Each year it turns out differently and I love to see what we all come up with.

This year we added an new element to our Winterhaven tradition.  We stopped at Amy's donuts and each picked one to eat while we looked at Christmas lights.  They were messy and delicious!

We read lots of Christmas books each Christmas, another favorite tradition.  We have several of our own and I borrow at least another twenty books from the library.  As you can see, Oliver loves story time.

On Christmas Eve we get in our Christmas jammies and we write Santa a letter thanking him for the gifts he brings and we leave him a few sweet treats to help him power through his long night.

Josh had to work on Christmas Day so we moved Christmas to December 24th and opened our presents a day earlier than the rest of the world.  Lillian about burst with excitement when she found a piece of Santa's coat stuck in our front door!

 We had a lovely morning opening gifts followed by a short church service filled with beautiful music.

Freya always knows exactly what to get Lillian for Christmas. When I take her shopping she marches in to the correct aisle and grabs the gift she knows Lillian will love.  No hemming and hawing. No wandering and wondering. Boom!  She knows.

 In our family Christmas dresses are right up there with Easter dresses. Festive dresses are a must!

The girls and I spent actual Christmas Day at my aunt's house.  They kids played while we made our traditional Christmas cookie, the pizzelle.  We make several batches of these cookies once a year because you have to cook them one at a time in an iron on the stove. They are so worth it though.

After eating way too many pizzelles we ate our traditional Italian Christmas dinner.

That night we went home with full bellies and happy hearts.

Then we got up and did it all over again in Utah with Nona and Ppa! 

 

Out of all the gifts these two girls received this Christmas, I would have to say these babies are their favorite.  Freya asked for a curly haired "Leaf Baby" (Cabbage Patch) for months so her love for her baby, Lynnie Lou has been no surprise. I had no idea how much Lillian would like her doll.  She carries Daisy Fay every where and changes her in to her pajamas each night.  I thought for sure Lillian would love her twin Hatchimals the most but after a few hours of caring for them she was asking, "Mom, will you please watch these guys for a while?"  When Grandma Patty got her another set of twins she about lost it! "Oh no! Not more!  Here Freya, you can have them!"  I guess Daisy Fay is a little more low maintenance.

 Freya's second favorite Christmas present was the package of pistachios she found in her stocking. This kid goes through "stachios" like they are going out of style.  Her favorite person to eat them with is Ppa because he shells them for her.

There wasn't a whole lot of snow at Nona's this year but there was enough to build a snowman and have some snowball fights.

You can see for yourself what Oliver thought of the snow!

In the few short days we were up there Josh helped remodel my sister's kitchen and put new flooring in. We had to leave before it was completed and I am excited to see how it all turned out.

 We ended 2017 with our traditional White Elephant gift exchange party.  It was a hoot! There were some pretty funny gifts given!

In between all of our Christmas traditions we threw in a few other fun activities. I went to an ugly sweater party with friends and had a blast.

 Josh got our backyard almost completely finished. After having it torn up for the past four years I felt like a Christmas miracle had occurred!

 Freya and I had fun hanging out and working at Papa's house.  He always has interesting stuff to play with.

We had a fun morning in Lillian's class for her pajama breakfast.  The kids ate breakfast, watched The Grinch, and exchanged gifts.

 These two participated in their first Nativity as shepherds.  Who would have thought old pillow cases could be so useful?

It was a merry month. Perhaps my favorite part of December was having Lillian home from school for part of the month. Man, I miss that kid when she is gone.  While writing this I realized we have many more traditions than I thought and they don't seem quite as lame now that I am looking through all my pictures.  The time we spent with family, the memories we made, it shaped us. It continues to shape us.  Tevye says it best, "Tradition. Without our traditions our lives would be as shaky as a fiddler on the roof."