Christmas is my favorite holiday. As a child, there was always something magical about this time of year. Spending time with family, putting up a Christmas tree, decorations at church…I knew that every year, I would get to spend time at both of my grandparents’ houses with all of my extended family and eat a ton of delicious food.
One of my grandmas was a wonderful cook. Her side of the family was Hungarian, and she made everything from scratch. I can still remember great big containers filled with sausages, mounds of different sides, and So. Many. Pies!
My other grandma wasn’t a great cook. Mom jokes that Grandma is the reason she likes everything well done, but it’s kind of true. The thing I remember loving best at that set of grandparent’s house on Christmas was the huge family gathering. There would be cousins that I didn’t see often throughout the year, and a lot of the family would be in their Detroit Lions gear. Most of the time, there would be a game on that all the men watched in the living room, and I would sit out in the kitchen with my aunts and chit-chat.
As an adult, the magic of Christmas has shifted, and it’s all about the magic I create for my own kids. Being a special needs family has necessitated changing our traditions somewhat since large gatherings are hard for some of them, but we still have a few that we enjoy.
Our most important tradition is spending Christmas Eve at our church, where we have a candlelight service every year. When the kids were younger, it was always a little stressful making sure there were no mishaps with the candles, but praise God, now that they’re older, I can focus on singing “Silent Night” and being grateful for the gift of our Savior.
Another tradition we have takes place after the Christmas Eve service. We come home, and all of my kids open one gift. They know the gift is always pajamas, but they’re excited to open them anyway. For a while, they came from our Elf on the Shelf, Sparkle. I must confess, I’m VERY happy that I don’t have to keep up with Sparkle anymore. I used to forget to move that elf all. the. time. There are only so many good excuses for why the elf didn’t move for days. Oof.
And before you laugh at me for not setting a reminder up on my phone, my oldest daughter is a legitimate genius, and the one time I tried, she found out about it and wanted to know why I had a reminder about Sparkle on my phone. Kids. LOL
Once the kids are all in their new pajamas, we take pajama pics, and each year, the kids sing a Christmas song they chose that I record so I can post it to my personal social media as a Christmas card for my family and friends. We’ve had some years where they even got instruments involved! As they get older, I wonder every year whether this will be the last year of our Christmas song, but so far, they’ve been happy to keep that tradition going. I have pictures and videos from every year since they were old enough to learn a song to sing!
Christmas traditions played an important part in my novella, A Christmas Blessing. Since they’re so important to me, I wanted a character who would embody that same spirit of Christmas that I love so much. Parker is one of my favorite heroes, and I absolutely adore how he took what was a difficult time of year for his love interest, Lauren, and made it into something just as meaningful for her.
I keep the Kindle version of my Christmas novella at the low cost of $.99 (or its equivalent in other markets) year-round as my gift to my readers, and as with all of my books, it is free to read on Kindle Unlimited. You can find it here!
So, tell me some of your favorite Christmas traditions in the comments.
Judith McNees lives in Michigan, where she enjoys spending time hiking with her kids and breaking out into random songs to annoy them. She loves to travel, and visiting all 50 states with her husband is at the top of her bucket list. She has a B.A. in English from Western Michigan University and is a member of American Christian Fiction Writers.
I don’t recall traditions so much as the people in our lives. As with you my grandparents were so special to me and the family gatherings are what I remember the most. I don’t know the Detroit Lions but in Australia there is always a cricket match which was mandatory watching for both genders after Christmas after we had played cricket outside. Merry Christmas and thank you for sharing your wonderful Christmas memories with us.
Sounds very lovely Dianne. Detroit Lions are an American football team. I was never really intrigued by sports…was more into the arts myself. Thank you for sharing and Merry Christmas!
Hi Judith! As German immigrants to Michigan, our immediate family with church family (friends) embraced our German Christmas traditions – Advent, St. Nikolaus Day, scrumptious sweets and chocolate. Growing up Christmas Eve service was the Children’s program – we attended a German speaking church. In the 1980s my husband was a pastor to a German speaking church in Chicago – the highlight was our Christmas Eve candlelight and carols service. We sang Silent Night in the original German and then the congregation sang the carol in 19 languages simultaneously! A bit of heaven on earth. Happy Holidays and best wishes.
Wow! I would have loved to hear “Silent Night” in 19 languages. I bet it was just beautiful. Makes me tear up thinking about it, although I’m tearing up a lot these days. Christmas sure does make me sentimental. Thanks for sharing and Merry Christmas!
All of my traditions changed with Mom’s passing back in 2020. This year, I’ve decided not to decorate at all, as things were just too stressful from October through the end of my busy season on Dec 15th. So, this time from now through the end of the year, is to just de-stress and enjoy doing what I want to do.
Sounds like a lovely way to enjoy the season, Trudy. I pray you experience many unexpected blessings this year as you rest.
I love the idea of a Christmas song, it’s a lovely thing to send friends and family.
The last few years when we’ve taken the kids to visit Santa we take a picture which we have made into a bauble for the tree, they love getting them out each year and looking at themselves in the old pictures. This year was the first year the two year old would go in the photo, she was a bit scared of Santa last year but this year she was brave and held on to her big sister’s hand.
I love that idea Ruthie! I’m a HUGE lover of meaningful Christmas ornaments. Thank you for the comment and Merry Christmas!
I read from Luke 2 on Christmas Eve. This is the first year without my Mom so we are having a low key Christmas. Thank you for sharing. Merry Christmas. God bless you.
So very sorry for your loss, Debra. Extra prayers and love being sent your way.
Our church has been reading from Luke 2 every week for advent season, adding a bit more of the story each week.
Thanks for sharing and Merry Christmas to you as well.
We don’t really have many traditions…we put the tree together little by little due to lack of time (I’m a university student, my dad works and my mom takes care of my brother with special needs who we joke is a little cat because he loves to knock the tree over if you don’t watch it) but well it’s more or less like this:
– Dad will start playing his CD of Christmas songs in the car in November and he won’t take it off until January, so every morning he leaves me at the university and in the afternoons on the way back it plays (if you have doubts in Chile it is normal to go to university at the same time that you live at home and no one cares if your parents are going to drop you off by car, sometimes you can take your friends to their houses too).
– My dad will put up the Christmas lights outside and mom will decorate the house (with her handmade decorations).Dad won’t have time so we both put together the tree (my brother will try to destroy our work haha) at the top is a woven angel that my mother made years ago and some cards that I made as a child (horribly cut out).
– There are old sets of Christmas soldiers and angels that have lost arms, legs or wings…well I love those figurines because I used to play with them as a child, the angels look like girls and the soldiers look like boys, so I assure you that every year I will find one Ingenious way to hang them on the tree in pairs. One year my mom made a Christmas card with these couples that I put together for fun. It was an angel girl hugging a soldier who was missing a leg she has cut the thread that holds her to the tree branch, so it depends on the little one. soldier hold her so she doesn’t fall.
We never had the big family meet ups. mostly it was just our little family. I am the youngest cousin on both sides one side there are a couple cousins my brothers age (hes over 4 years older) and the other side the next youngest was about 10 years older than me. with a couple having kids my age. I never met most on that side. So I tend to miss not having those memories.
We always went to church on christmas day. (only occasionally when on a monday our church didn’t have a service) I have miss only two in my life time and one I was just out of hospital. This year I am not sure if I will be going as our church again won’t have a service but will decide Sunday. We always had bacon for breakfast I think cos dad didn’t have to go to work and would cook the bacon and it became a tradition we would have bacon for breakfast. We normally watch carols in candlelight on tv Christmas eve.
now its just me and the cats (one is on vacation at the old area) for christmas but I still decorate etc
I have 3 special needs children, so I understand about the tree. When the youngest was still little, I would surround ours with a baby gate on a coffee table so he couldn’t get to it. My ornaments mean a lot to me since they’re all bought to commemorate special events, so I’ve given up trying to put them on the tree. For now, we use cheap, shatterproof ornaments that we have to replace every couple of years. I love that your ornaments are hand made. Your tree sounds lovely. Thank you for sharing and Merry Christmas!
I can definitely get behind bacon as a tradition. Bacon makes everything better! 😋
Thank you for your comment and Merry Christmas!