Featured Article: Holiday Traditions

Holiday Traditions by Sarah L.

Originally published in the December 2011 Indian Creek MOPS newsletter

What’s your family’s holiday tradition?  Traditions can make the holidays more memorable for kids.  I have many fond memories of baking cookies before decorating the Christmas tree and driving around town looking at the Christmas lights while we sip hot chocolate.  Growing up, my husband’s family always opened one present after church on Christmas Eve and then saved the rest for the next morning.  Sometimes traditons are silly things that are not started intentionally, for example, my family passed a hideous sock monkey around to nearly 40 people over a 20 year period, always surprising the recipient for one occasion or another.  Other times they take a great deal of thought and planning like a cookie exchange.

Another favorite tradition is the food!  Does your family usually feast on the same favorite dishes for each holiday?  Whether its turkey for Thanksgiving, ham for Easter, or burgers and brats for the Fourth of July it seems that the main course is always the same and the same side dishes are brought by the same family member each year.  

While family traditions are great sometimes they seem to bring me more stress than holiday cheer.  For me, stress started becoming a personal holiday tradition.  I run errands, check the calendar, bake, cook, clean, wrap, do laundry, pack, and repeat.  I have lengthy phone conversations with family to try to plan a strategy to fit in each side of the family without missing out on any gatherings.

One year we had an extra stressful Christmas season.  I felt behind on everything,

money was tight, one of my kids was having health issues, a family member was in the hospital and another passed away.  Add to that the errands, cleaning, cooking, wrapping, baking, and I was wishing the holidays were over as fast as they arrived.
    On that particularly stressful year when I was more focused on my to do list and my problems instead of the actual reason for the Christmas season, the birth of God’s son. This is when God taught me something far more important.  
    It was a typical year.  The tree was decorated, the cookies were baked, and the presents were wrapped. We were packed and ready to go out of town where we would rush from location to location trying to fit in all the extended family.  God had other plans.  It snowed....a lot!  In fact, we were snowed in.  Even our family back home was snowed in.  We were literally stuck in our house for all of Christmas day.  We took our time opening presents, stayed in our pajamas for most of the day, feasted on what food we had in the house, played with all our new toys, built a snowman, and spent time together.  There were no extended family members, no company, no cooking, running, or rushing.  It was the most relaxing Christmas that we have ever had.
    The next day, when the snow was cleared a little more and it was safe to drive we did go visit family and see everyone on the list and had a great time.  My husband and I learned something that year that we will make one of our family traditions from now on.  Christmas isn’t about rushing around running errands and getting everything done as planned. It is about the birth of Jesus and how his life and death changed mine and yours.  It is about spending time with family not having everything perfect.  It is about enjoying family traditions not stressing about them.
    I encourage you to slow down this month and re-evaluate which traditions are the most important to you and the most memorable to your kids and which ones are just plain too much work.  This year, buy the Christmas cookies or just forget them altogether (who needs those extra calories anyway?).  Shop online and have the items shipped to your house.  Have your husband and kids pitch in with chores and errands (okay, we will see about that one....).  Say “no” to one more party. Take a deep breath, relax, and enjoy this special time when our children are young and so excited about the season.  Christmas traditions are a wonderful part of our memories but the real memories are from the time spent with those closest to you and the birth of a baby that changed the world.

Merry Christmas!