Dec 9, 2008
Posted by Serenity in family, holidays | 11 Comments
traditions are like the rules of Calvin-ball, you add new ones any time you want
My mom is really good at new traditions. When I moved out, she debated over whether or not to send me with the long, narrow stocking that matched my siblings’, which she’d hung every year for Christmas. She ended up getting me a new one instead to take with me. She’s had to change a lot of traditions over the years. And I never knew her to do it with very much sadness. She’s the one, you know, who keeps foolishly promising me that every stage of life is as wonderful as the next despite my determination to be blue at the thought that my poor children are growing so quickly.
This is a picture of a tradition she started several years ago. One white gift bag for every family of my siblings and I for each day of December. Our kids all have various methods for deciding who gets to open the package every day. Mine have an elaborate process – one picks out the proper date and unties the ribbon, the other takes out the tissue paper for the big reveal. The next day they switch. Jake is – you know – also there.
So today’s ornament is from one of the packages. It’s the Grinch. We also have an older Grinch ornament, so I gave them both some billing.
New and old. I like life to be plenty stuffed with both.
The curse of not getting my tree up early is that my new Grinch has already lost his light-up heart! One of my children, probably the smallest one in cahoots with the dog, pulled the innards right out of that ornament! Now we can’t get him to light up, but he still looks happy.
I love Mom’s Christmas bags. Too many days already their contents have been “secret breakfast” for my kids. I figure, oh well, its almost Christmas! : )
The heart lights up? How do you get it to do that? Nobody pulled our innards out . . .
Can you email me this picture? It makes my little tradition look like something out of Better Homes & Gardens instead of the dollar store experience it usually is.
I think there were instructions in the Grinch box for turning on the light.
And this is totally the best part of my Christmas. When I skipped it last year, Christmas was lame.
What a fun tradition! And, I LOVE the Grinch … definitely not Christmas without him too! And, I loved yesterday’s post. I bet your blue and silver tree is gorgeous … that has been my favorite color combination for a couple years … so my packages/ribbon are silvery and snowflakey, with shades of blue!
The red ball unscrews and there is a white button to push. Then you can turn it off when you turn off the lights on the tree if you want – save the battery.
I forgot to put my comment in the circulating email the other day, so I’ll do it here. Our boys are strict birth orderists. Peter opened December 1st, Jude the 2nd and back and forth from there. Sims, like Jake, is also there. :-)
Our Grinch still lights up, faintly, because we left him on a lot. He is so cute though.
Sure enough! His heart looks like it’s growing two sizes right before our eyes. I’m loving it.
I’m just really glad to hear about Felicity’s children sneaking into and breaking stuff. That’s just the sort of Christmas tradition my kids seem to indulge in.
I love traditions! And this one was especially fun to read……
luv
Tiff
What a great tradition. And it’s true…each stage is so wonderful on its own. My oldest is now at college and I’m thrilled to watch her experience everything. I miss her, but I’m so happy for her! Still, sending her stocking with her when she finally gets her own permanent place? Your mom is brave! I hope I can be as well!
My youngest is the guardian of our family traditions. He LOVES them so much, and doesn’t want anything to change as we all get older. I’m so grateful for that!
I’m definitely going to have to get advice from your mom on creating new traditions! I love all our old traditions, but now Rachel has a family of her own and we’re going to have to adapt. I told her we did everything we did for them, and now it’s time for her to do it for her children. Our traditions may just get passed along to the next generation and we’ll have to create some new “Grandparent” sort of traditions!