Christmas Traditions

Oh - what a wonderful time of year!  It looks like we will have a beautiful white Christmas this year!  I know many of you read my post yesterday about the Santa dilemma (join in the heated debate if you'd like!  I love all the comments!) and today I am seeking even more stories.

You see, this is only the second Christmas in the nearly 10 years that Hubby and I have been married where we have been home for Christmas day.  We have been so busy over the years that we haven't really created our own Christmas traditions.  Now that we are a growing family, those traditions are important to us.

So far, we have our Advent calendar which is a work in progress.  Each sock will have (hopefully by next year) a Bible verse, an activity, and an item.  Right now, we have a few items (mainly nativity figures) in the socks but that's all we have had time for!  We are making Christmas cookies as a family (we'll see how helpful a 14 month old can be!), and we are working out our Christmas morning traditions.

Growing up, my family had a ritual of torture for the children.  We grew up believing in Santa.  We put cookies and milk out Christmas eve.  We put carrots out for the reindeer (they are so often forgotten).  We always went to the Christmas eve service.  We would often celebrate at least weekly through Advent as a family.  Christmas morning was filled with rules that, over the years, I have come to love.

1. Family goes downstairs together - nobody goes down before Mom and Dad are awake - no earlier than 7am.  Everyone will be either dressed or in a robe and slippers with teeth and hair brushed.
2. Dad leads the family down stairs after securing the sheet over the living room doorway.  The family eats a full breakfast and cleans up.
3. After breakfast is cleaned up, stockings were opened.  That mess must be cleaned up as well.
4. Only at this time would Dad take down the sheet from the doorway so we could see the tree and the bounty beneath.
5. Once our excitement and awe subsided just a little bit, we began the long process of opening gifts.  We opened them one at a time so everyone could enjoy everyone else's excitement at their gift.
6. Once the paper was cleaned up, the Christmas Weapons came out.  One stocking gift each year has been weaponry of some sort from nerf guns to rubber bands.  For about 2 hours following gift opening, we have a family-wide and house-wide war complete with bunkers and forts and everything.
7. After the war subsided, the boys would work on assembling toys while the girls worked on Christmas dinner.

As adults, we still keep many of these traditions when we get together as a family.

As Hubby and I are creating our own family traditions, we'd love to hear yours in case it is something we really like and might "borrow!"