Holiday Traditions
 

So what are your holiday traditions that you and your family do?

I just mentioned this in another thread, but one I started with my husband when we got married is on Christmas Eve, we all get to unwrap a new set of pyjamas. Then we change into them, watch A Muppet Christmas Carol, eat popcorn and sing along. You have to be extra loud on "After all there's only one more sleep 'til Chri-ist-mas!" ...because there is.

Another is that early on Christmas morning, we phone up my parents, my brothers, aunts, uncles etc. and sing "We Wish You A Merry Christmas" loudly down the phone at them. That's one I've done since I was a little kid, and my family all get up very early on Christmas morning, so it's kind of a race to see who phones the earliest.
(Husby and I tried doing it to his family one year... turns out they don't get out of bed as early as my family do. It did not go down well.)

And we do stockings! But I think that's a common tradition- stockings hang over the fireplace, then we all take ours to bed on Christmas eve and "Santa" fills it while you sleep.
Our little twist on it is that our very spoiled house rabbit, Sir Basil, has his own tiny stocking too. We even hang it up on the fireplace with the others, then hang it over his bed on Christmas Eve, and Santa drops a new toy or treat in it. He also gets his own Christmas Dinner- two Brussels sprouts (which he normally isn't allowed, as he's prone to gas) on one of the fancy saucers.

How adorable! Sir Basil! Do you ever give him basil?

We hang stockings too. I have yet to hang up mine and my husbands yet, (we also have one for each of our dogs). We usually leave them wherever we hang them up. This is our first year in our house, so I'm anxious to see the traditions we start.

Growing up, we used to decorate the tree together as a family. We also made one year those homemade salt cookie ornaments.

Yes we do! His love of basil is actually where he got his name from. Then he mastered the use of his litter tray, so I knighted him.

That's exciting! Have you guys thought of any new traditions to start yet, or are you waiting to see what happens?

We decorate the tree as a family too- we've got kids now though, so I've had to learn to stop being so obsessive over having a "perfectly decorated" tree, and just accept that the tinsel will be lopsided and my 5 year-old is going to hang every bauble at her eye level! [XD]

My Christmas traditions have changed a bunch because of my parents divorcing, now I have a step family, and am engaged.

When I was a kid my mom would procrastinate (she was a postal worker so Christmas was busy time... except she seemed to find time before work to do cookies. -.-), she would wrap all our gifts on Christmas eve with my dad. Because of them not being done till 6am some years and not being morning people, my older brother and I would be up long before the parents. We were allowed to open our stockings when we came downstairs and that's all we could unwrap. We would wait till 10am to wake them up.
Another one when I was a kid, we used to go over to my mom's parents for Christmas eve and Christmas. When we would be there for christmas eve, we were allowed to open one gift that night.

I've also experienced the getting up early (and I mean 3.30am) Christmas morning with my now fiancé's family for gifts. Def glad to not deal with that anymore (they don't get up AS early, plus I don't wnat to).

Now it's getting up at a normal time and unwrapping gifts with my dad, stepmom, and stepsister. My fiancé picks me up around 9-10am :D

My family has not really kept up with any traditions. Actually this month has gone by so fast that I haven't really felt Christmas, its kind of hard to believe that Christmas is two days away. Does anyone else feel this way? I kind of feel bad for missing out on most of the festivities.

We just make ourselves three awesome meals, nothing else, much.

For as long as I can remember my family has done the same things every year for Christmas Eve and Christmas.
So on Christmas Eve my mother gives my sister and I each one present and it's always Christmas jammies.
So then we put on our jammies and go to sleep and the next morning when we wake up our mom starts the breakfast and my sister and I go through our stockings :D
After breakfast we all open our gifts one at a time until we're done. It's quite a nice tradition to have and I'm sure my sister will continue it with her kids when she has them.
I probably will too, if I ever have kids, which isn't something I'm planning on XD

We have a lot of seafood for christmas eve dinner, even though I hate seafood. :U It's because we're Italian.

My family also does the Christmas Jammies on Christmas eve. In fact, I'm snuggly in them right now. ^^

My family doesn't really have very many traditions. There is maybe two that I know of. We have what we call cookie candy day every year. Usually before Christmas, basically a crap ton of cookies and other goodies get made, and at the end of the day it all gets boxed up and sent out to family, friends, and neighbors. o3o There was a ton of cookies this year.

And at my Grandmas house we always have her homemade pizza for Christmas dinner, with Strawberry danish junket for dessert.

For Hanukkah, we light the candles for each night. (It lasts for 8 nights.) I love using one of our really old menorahs. It has a lot of 'character'. There were some years my mom would take out all of our menorahs (we have a lot!), put as many as we could fit on the piano and light them all on the last day. It was glorious to see, and was probably a huge fire hazard. It was warm, too.

We usually have latkes, which are like German potato pancakes. Some years my mom would make them from scratch. They were tiring to make, but they came out so tasty! Now, I tend to get the boxed mix kind. But, even that takes a while to cook. We also eat sufganiyot or jelly filled donuts. Plus, other oily-type foods.

I used to play dreidel at least during one of the nights. I've collected a lot of them over the years. We also eat gelt or chocolate coins which tend to be used during the game. When my mom was around, we also sang songs together. We also exchanged presents, but we haven't done that in a while. It's not that big of a deal to us. We also go to at least 1 Hanukkah party each year.

Menorahs look beautiful...

every christmas eve we have a big family dinner with the cousins and the grandparents. on christmas morning all the kids kid on my parents bed (we usually end up breaking it) then open presents and go see a movie