10 Days of Christmas #6: Traditions

        

   Hello everybody, and welcome to the Ten Days of Christmas blog party! I'm very excited to be participating in this. This blog event will be posted every two days. Specifically, December 4th, 6th, 8th, 10th, 12th, 14th, 16th, 18th, 20th, and 22nd. On each day but the last one, the theme will be associated with a certain letter of "Christmas." At the end of the event (the 22nd), the winner of the giveaway will be announced.

With that brief overview out of the way, let's get started!

Today's letter from C-H-R-I-S-T-M-A-S is "T" for

        

   We've got a few traditions up our sleeves. I enjoy them immensely. They make Christmas . . . Christmas.

(All photos in this post are courtesy of the internet.)

-Christmas tree

   We always take a day and go tree-hunting. Chilled fingers, pink noses, scents of broken pine, and ruffled coat hoods are common during this trip. We tramp through the U-cut tree farms to find the perfect tree. Of course, with there being a fair amount of people in my family, there's usually a rather passionate debate over which tree is the best. If a person ends up on the winning side of the good-natured argument, they will go home satisfied. If they end up on the losing side, however, they will try to memorize the exact location of their favorite candidate so they can plead its case next Christmas . . . that is, if it's still there. Once I even took a picture of the one I liked, but it had vanished by the time the next holiday season rolled around. 

   However, I will note that this year, we weren't able to do this because of sold-out U-cut trees (and closed-down farms due to the pandemic), so we had to resort to a pre-cut tree. The tree ended up very nice, though. Sturdy and tall.

After we get it home, our "Christmas box" takes a vacation and travels from the garage to the house. My mom always hands out each person's ornaments. This is a fun, familiar, cozy time of the holiday season. We've been doing it ever since I can remember.

-Christmas story

   We read one advent story each year. Our selection (all of these books are linked together) includes:

Jotham's Journey

Tabitha's Travels

Bartholomew's Passage

This book is a part of this series, but we have yet to read it.

Ishtar's Odyssey

-Christmas cookies

   We bake cookies every Christmas. It is a delicious part of the tradition. 

We make:

spritz 

"snowballs"

fattigman-- a Norwegian cookie (also known as poor man cookies)

and krumkake-- also a Norwegian dessert.

-Christmas breakfast

   We also have a special breakfast. We eat things like fruitcake, pickles (yuuuuum!), sausage, etc. It's a delight.

-Christmas movies

   We usually start on our list of holiday movies right after Thanksgiving. I'd get into this more, but that topic is on the agenda for Wednesday's post, so . . . 

-Bible reading

   On Christmas morning, before opening a single present, my dad gets out the Bible and reads the true CHRISTmas story, from the Gospels. The story of Christ's birth, that is. I'd get into this topic more too, if it weren't for the fact that it's already in the "Ten Days of Christmas" lineup. So give me until the 20th, and I'll go deeper into that tradition. :)

-Christmas bowls

   We have these adorable snowman bowls that we set out on the table every Christmas and fill with Christmas candy (and Reese's peanut butter cups are the best, by the way! Well, for me, at least. I love peanut butter chocolate!). We just starting doing it one year, and it's become something we do every time. And . . . yeah. ;)

-Christmas lights

   We put up Christmas lights around our roof every Christmas. Okay, that's not entirely true. Rephrase: we turn on the already-up lights every Christmas. We actually leave up the lights around our house basically year-round and every year, so we just have to check them to make sure they're still good and then turn them on.

-Nativity set

   We set up our Nativity set every year. The main stable goes on our piano, while the wise men and camels go on the top of a nearby cabinet, to symbolize their journey to Jesus. And then, on Christmas Day, we take the wise men down from the cabinet and place them at the stable to show that they've "arrived." Historical note: they didn't actually get to Jesus on the day of his birth (they estimate that Jesus was between one year and three years old, most likely, when they got to Him), but it's a fun thing we do on Christmas, all the same.

   We have a lot more traditions, probably; ones I can't think of right now. :D And this list is a decent length, so I think it's a good time to end the post.

 Visit Little Blossoms for Jesus, Culinary Scribbles, and Rebekah's Reading Room to see the coordinating posts from the other participants, and don't forget to enter the giveaway!