Growing up, my family and I (Amanda) traveled to Alexandria,
LA each year to spend Christmas. We adopted
a tradition of letting Santa know that he needed to come a few days early to
visit us in Dallas before we packed
up the car and headed to LA to see family. So we would read the Christmas story
from the bible and then go look at Christmas lights the night before our road
trip. While we were gone, Santa would visit! Then we headed to Alexandria
where there would eventually be 13 grandchildren (10 of them girls!). We have
such fond memories playing together and sleeping like sardines on Memaw and
Pawpaw’s living room floor. Now there are 16 great grandchildren (13 of which
are girls!). Needless to say, I was super bummed when Hallie woke up with a
fever the day before we were supposed to leave and I had to accept that we
would not be able to travel to Alexandria
this year for Christmas.
Instead of sulking all day about not being able to go, Jason
inspired me to think positive and establish our own family traditions right
here at home with just our little family J Here are four we came
up with and we hope to add more in the future years!
New tradition #1: Playroom
Clean-Up: We decided that since we were about to get plenty of new toys for
Christmas, we should go through our playroom and identify every toy we rarely
or no longer play with. That way we can save those toys for Caroline or give
them away to a family that might need them. We evaluated the “fun-factor” of
each toy and let the girls keep only their favorites. Now the playroom is
clean, organized, and ready for some new toys!
New tradition #2: Acting
out the Nativity: Thanks to my good friend Lindsay, we own a super cute
nativity scene and a board book called “The Story of Christmas”. While mommy
read the book aloud, the girls moved the figurines around to act out all the
parts of the story of Jesus’ birth. It was super easy and a great way for the
girls to realize the reason for the season and be a part of it!
New tradition #3:
Build a Gingerbread House with Daddy the Architect: While mommy took care
of Caroline, Hallie and Annabelle built a gingerbread house with daddy. They
loved decorating their own parts of the house and taking ownership in them.
Then daddy put the house together making sure it was nice and sturdy (and while
telling Belle every 5 seconds to stop eating the candy pieces) and then they
stood back to admire their work!
New tradition #4: Advent
Calendar: We started this one on December 1st. Each night (that
we remembered to ;)) we sat around the living room as a family, read something
from the daily readings (usually the Psalm) and then went to each person and
said aloud what we were thankful for. Next, one girl would take baby Jesus out
of one pocket and the other daughter would put him back in the next pocket.
(what are we going to do when there are three girls to fight over Jesus!?)
