Just before Thanksgiving, a friend asked me what kinds of traditions our family has for celebrating the holidays.
I paused and tried in earnest to think of something interesting to offer.
"Well, we put up a Christmas tree and go to church on Christmas Eve and exchange gifts, but aside from that, nothing extraordinary."
I was disappointed in my answer.
I wondered why in 10 years of marriage and six years of creating holiday memories for our children, we had so few rituals to wrap our holiday season around.
The truth is, no two holidays can be the same for us from year to year. Nick and I have been apart for a few, together in the hometowns of either of our families for others, and on other years we've hosted extended family get-togethers in our home.
As we prepared to celebrate our first family Christmas with just the five of us alone together in our new home in D.C. this year, I started paying attention to how it is we might go about celebrating.
What I realized is that without even knowing it, we've carved out a few traditions for ourselves over the past couple of years.
First, there's St. Lucia's Day, which our girl has come to require just as much as candycanes and letters to St. Nick.
Then there's our culinary observance of Hanukkah, which started with our yearly attendance of our neighborhood library's children's Hanukkah party back in San Diego. Now we can't let December pass without some Hanukkah stories and fried potato fritters with applesauce.
Then there's the important birthday we celebrate. This year there were eggnog cupcakes, a new train engine and stuffed dinosaur and a fresh, new two-year-old.
There's my perennial gift from Nick.
This year's design includes nods to our trip to Hawaii and our move to D.C.
Even though I know it's coming, every year I cry when the mailman delivers it. I marvel at how Nick finds the time to get the pages all laid out in secret and how he turns my ramblings and snapshots into a real work of art.
Nick reads "Sugar and Snails" religiously throughout the year, of course, and he is my best and only editor. He doesn't lavish praise over my work every single day, but when he puts the bound copy of my hard work and passion under the Christmas tree, that's when I know how important it is to him, too.
***
And this year we added a Christmas Day get-away intended to give Nick and I a break from the hard work of holiday-making. And I think this just might become a tradition.
And so we put the holidays of 2011 to bed and look ahead to the wide-openness of 2012. I know a sea of possibilities stands between here and next Christmas. Life doesn't guarantee us the same set of circumstances this time next year, but if we're all still here, in this home, I think we'll have some pretty good ideas for how to celebrate.
If you're interested in some more about what we've been up to in the month of December, check out these photo posts here and here. Happy New Year!
I paused and tried in earnest to think of something interesting to offer.
"Well, we put up a Christmas tree and go to church on Christmas Eve and exchange gifts, but aside from that, nothing extraordinary."
I was disappointed in my answer.
I wondered why in 10 years of marriage and six years of creating holiday memories for our children, we had so few rituals to wrap our holiday season around.
The truth is, no two holidays can be the same for us from year to year. Nick and I have been apart for a few, together in the hometowns of either of our families for others, and on other years we've hosted extended family get-togethers in our home.
As we prepared to celebrate our first family Christmas with just the five of us alone together in our new home in D.C. this year, I started paying attention to how it is we might go about celebrating.
What I realized is that without even knowing it, we've carved out a few traditions for ourselves over the past couple of years.
First, there's St. Lucia's Day, which our girl has come to require just as much as candycanes and letters to St. Nick.
Then there's our culinary observance of Hanukkah, which started with our yearly attendance of our neighborhood library's children's Hanukkah party back in San Diego. Now we can't let December pass without some Hanukkah stories and fried potato fritters with applesauce.
Then there's the important birthday we celebrate. This year there were eggnog cupcakes, a new train engine and stuffed dinosaur and a fresh, new two-year-old.
There's my perennial gift from Nick.
This year's design includes nods to our trip to Hawaii and our move to D.C.
Even though I know it's coming, every year I cry when the mailman delivers it. I marvel at how Nick finds the time to get the pages all laid out in secret and how he turns my ramblings and snapshots into a real work of art.
Nick reads "Sugar and Snails" religiously throughout the year, of course, and he is my best and only editor. He doesn't lavish praise over my work every single day, but when he puts the bound copy of my hard work and passion under the Christmas tree, that's when I know how important it is to him, too.
***
And this year we added a Christmas Day get-away intended to give Nick and I a break from the hard work of holiday-making. And I think this just might become a tradition.
And so we put the holidays of 2011 to bed and look ahead to the wide-openness of 2012. I know a sea of possibilities stands between here and next Christmas. Life doesn't guarantee us the same set of circumstances this time next year, but if we're all still here, in this home, I think we'll have some pretty good ideas for how to celebrate.
If you're interested in some more about what we've been up to in the month of December, check out these photo posts here and here. Happy New Year!
I've always admired the way your family comes together around holidays and special occasions. You always seem to get right at the heart of what's important. Every holiday you write about sounds like a celebration of the life and love all around you. It's beautiful, really.
ReplyDeleteYou all definitely have put together some fun sounding traditions. I especially love the idea of "culinary observance" -- I think I'm going to start using that ;)
ReplyDelete