Christmas Tradtitions (The Davidson Side)

Now that Christmas is over and I am on vacation, I have time again. And I promised myself that i would write a bit about the Christmas Traditions coming from my side of the family.

With the Davidsons, tradition centers more around Christmas Eve and Christmas day, as opposed to the events leading up until Christmas.

There is the Christmas Eve party where everyone in my family (and I do mean EVERYONE, aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents, boyfriends and girlfriends of all involved...) crams together into somebody's house where we eat delectable food and exchange gifts. After everyone eats we crowd into a room and the younger children read take turns reading the sections of the Christmas story. Its really a beautiful thing to have the whole family together in one room and reading together the whole reason for Christmas. (somehow this didn't end up happening this year, which was really really sad to me). After that, the under 16 crowd do a "Secret Santa" (the names for which are typically exchanged at Thanksgiving). But the adults do a somewhat cutthroat version of white elephant gifts.

If you don't do a white elephant gift exchange, you totally should. Its the best. Here is how it works: Everyone brings a gift with no name on it and puts it in a heap of other gifts on the floor. The participating crowd draws numbers, and the fun begins. The first person picks a gift, which is fairly boring. But when number 2 gets his turn, he can choose to pick a gift from the pile OR steal the gift from the first person, who would then have to pick again. If a gift has been exchanged 3 times, then it is considered "dead" and can't be taken again. Compounding the interest is huge variety in gift quality. From bright pink mini tool sets, to "snuggies" to hand crafted pottery, to family heirlooms, you really could get just about anything. In one particularly well remembered exchange, my uncle unwisely picked a gift brought by my husband... a "Peruvian bar-b-q Set" which included a giant spatula, and Guinea pig bedding, among other things. This year, a 12 pack of beer went strangely quickly. This game gets rough, you guys. Bribing is common, and stealing is encouraged. Don't get to comfortable with that apple pie in the beautiful polish pottery dish. It won't be coming home with you.
After this, we are brought back around the table where a birthday cake sits. After singing happy birthday to Jesus and eating our cake, we start to pack up and go home. (AGAIN, something that didn't happen this year. How? How can this be?!?!)

On Christmas Morning after opening gifts, everyone gets their choice between baked oatmeal or oatmeal a la mode. We also eat some kind of egg dish and "monkey bread" If you don't know monkey bread, I am so so sorry.

I have to say, now that I am comfortably on the other side of the holidays; Christmas, while really lovely this year, lacked some of the traditions that I have come to depend on and love... Singing happy birthday to Jesus, reading the Christmas story all together as a family... I love that part of Christmas and looked forward to it. I missed it this year, and I truly hope that this doesn't mark the beginning of a trend in the family.

Christmas Tradtions (On the Warren Side)

By the power of youtube, a damp microfiber cloth, and compressed air, my space key has been fixed. And I don't mind telling you that I feel pretty accomplished now. I could totally work in the apple store, fixing space keys.

The family at Longwood Gardens

One of the beautiful things about folks getting married is that it combines 2 people with different family traditions, and together you get to pick and choose your favorites, and even start some new ones. Andy and I already have adopted a bunch of traditions in the 5 years that we have been married, some old, some new. Initially I was going to just combine them all in one post, but each family just has its own flavor, and I thought deserved their own posts.

From Andy's side of the family, the biggest traditions mostly come before the day itself. The highlights are picking the tree, going to Longwood Gardens to see the Christmas lights, and decorating the house.

When it comes to trees, there are 2 tree picking methods, the new and the old. The new method is the one currently in use by Andy's family. His parents have an exceedingly high ceiling in their living room, you see, and they always take advantage of its height by getting the biggest flipping tree they can possibly find. These trees have been given up by the tree farms as impossible to sell, because no one wants or can fit a 20 ft tree in the living room. They somehow break the laws of physics to get it through the door, and get many ladders to decorate it. One year, they only managed to string lights on the bottom two thirds of the tree. That's all they could reach people. I tried to find a picture to post, but I can't find one for the life of me.
Andy and I, who have normal ceilings in our house, adopted the old Christmas tree tradition in picking out a live tree, with a bulb intact so that it could be planted once Christmas was over. We even added to the tradition in a way. We always pick a white pine now, because they do the best in our soil. The other trees that we picked in previous years are a bit stunted, where they survived at all. So while a white pine may not be the most traditional of Christmas Trees, it has become our go to. We picked out our tree yesterday, a feat made easy by the fact that they only had 3 white pines bulb-d. Amelia wasn't terribly interested in the tree-picking. She liked to play in the mud and to look at the big tree grabber that loaded the tree into the truck that we borrowed from Andy's dad.

Behold, our tree, trussed up and ready to take home.

Longwood Gardens is about an hour and a half away from our house, and every year they decorate the whole park lavishly for Christmas. Lights everywhere. It is tradition for the Warrens to go around Christmas to freeze our little tails off watching the fountain display and admire the outside lights, to walk around to get some hot chocolate, cider or mulled wine and then to walk the conservatory look at the displays in a warmer setting. Longwood Gardens has become one of the favorite things that we do each year... and this year we are planning on doing it twice. 
 Quick (adorable) note: Amelia really loved the musical fountain display in particular. She just so happened to mix up the word "fountain" with "mountain" and was talking about the "fairy mountains" all evening. So cute! Now we went this year when it was relatively warm but it is usually freezing cold out, so bundle up for the outside lights! 

"Look at the pretty flowers!"

As for the decorating with the Warrens, the Christmas decorations aren't anything extravagant. just a few lights and some personalized stockings and all, but the thing is... my family never really decorated for Christmas. One extraordinary year, my mom hung a wreath on the door and put those fake candles in the windows, and this attempt blew our minds. Now, my family does a tree and stockings and always have, but that is IT for decorations. So we went with the Warren tradition of... you know... actually decorating. 

Oh, one other tradition that we adopted from the Warren side is that they got to pick out one small gift from their stockings on Christmas Eve. We all love the little taste before the "big day". 

So that's it for the Warren traditions that we are carrying on. Later, I will have to tell you about the Davidson Family traditions. 

What are some of your favorite holiday traditions?