Category: Elder Folk
I thought it would be interesting to talk about family and holiday traditions, or the ones people have started.
I started watching THE WIZARD OF OZ AND RUDOLF THE RED NOSE REIENDEER with my kids when they were small. Now, when those shows come on they'll call me and say, "Mom, remember." Corny yes, but sometimes corny stuff is chalk full of memories. So, what traditions do you remember, have started, or still do with your family, friends, or neighbors?
Every Christmas we eat lesagna in my family. It's one of though's good filling foods that takes no work at all, but to people that might happen to drop by unexpectidley it looks like you actuley spent some time cooking insted of playing with your children and there new toys all day. Witch is oddviecely what my parents did.
You only get to have your children little inuph to enjoy christmas with you for afew short years, so grab that danceing moose and forget about the fancy goose.
Intristing topic.
Tracey.
Well, my wife and I have a couple traditions. There was a small neighborhood jewlry store where I used to go to get my watch repared. Every Christmas, she always gets one piece of jewlry from me, and I always go to that store to get it. I like the tradition, and the staff couldn't be nicer. They're very patient with my questions, describe well, and giftwrap way neater than I do.
My wife always gets me a CD. These are the two gifts we open before Christmas services.
Some of you may know that my mother is in a nursing home. She has been the glue that held our family together over the years. As a result, some of our traditions are indeed changing. I've already p[romised myself that new traditions will be formed. I don't know what that means yet.
Lou
For Christmas, mum and I usually go round my Grandparents on Christmas Eve night to help prepare all the vegetables, stuffings, sauces, chestnuts and things for the ginormous Christmas turkey dinner the next afternoon. Next morning then, about 11:30, 1:00, we're all gathered round the Christmas-filled living room in my Grandparents Christmas-filled bungalo again, opening simply masses and masses of Christmas presents, cards and how's your fathers, then we pull our luxury crackers Gran always managed to get hold of every year, containing everything from magic tricks to small puzzles, quite nice fancy keyrings, fountain pens and things, then we tuck in to a simply gor'r'r'r'r'rgeous, flavoursome Christmas dinner, followed of course, by the famous plumb pudding. This goes on till around 3, halfpast 3 in the afternoon, then Gran (or rather Father Christmas) has left a sack of 'table presents' outside on the front step, so either me or my cousins has to fetch the sack indoors, open it up and hand out usually, quite small parcels to everybody round the dining table. Then, tea and coffee're usually consumed by all on top of a truckload of wine and various other alcollolic beverages, some of us go in the living room then and watch the queen's Christmas message on the television whilst opening up nearly all the gifts we received from each other that morning and either messing around with them or just admiring them for another two-and-a-half to three hours, then tea, sausage rolls, mince pies, chocolate florrentines and things're served, Eastenders is watched till halfpast 8/9:00, then we all break up, load all our Christmas loot in to our cars, wish everybody a Merry Christmas, then zoom off home on a Christmas-enduced high. Then that's generally how Christmas day round my place goes, lollol. It's a family tradition I'd never dream of breaking, even when I've left home, I'll always come back to celebrate Christmas round my Grandparents house on Christmas day.
Jen.
Well, I'm trying to start a tradition where my fiancee and I watch certain movies between Thanksgiving and Christmas. So far we try and work in the Mystery Science Theater 3000 version of "Santa Claus Conquers the Martians" and I'm thinking of getting the DVD of "A Christmas Story" just so we won't have to watch it on TV with all the breaks for commercials.
Wow Jen, post four.), the food sounds great!! Our family always has a ham dinner on christmas when we can get together. On Thanksgiving its football, and I always get the turkey leg. I also try and watch some of the old tv shows, they bring back to me fond memories when my grand parents, and my uncle and step father were alive.
i have a rather large family and traditions start with thanksgiving dinner at my grandparent's house. then everyone rushes home and race to see which family can get their christmas tree up first. the saturday after thanksgiving, most of the family attends the christmas parade here in town. my older sis and i still go to my parent's house to watch the classic shows like charlie brown and grandma got run over by a reindeer. santa always makes it to our house while we are at christmas eve mass. then homemade cinnamon rolls at mom and dad's christmas morning while opening the gifts. then lunch at granma's. there are s many more traditions like making candy and things with my mom. but i'll stop for now.
Hi everyone. Gen, your Christmas sounds delightful, and I love hearing about everyone else's traditions.
One thing is how time makes a person start new traditions: parents and grand parents pass away, kids grow up. After awhile, you have to be the one who starts the traditions, or carries on the old ones.
One tradition I've started for several years, is spending the holidays with some visually-impaired friends whose families don't live here. It's just common knowledge with families and other friends, I'll be with these friends, though anyone is welcome to join in the festivities. I've even canceled trips to be with them. Wouldn't have it any other way. Love your posts.
I am going to the mary bryant Home for the blind in Springfield Illinois to be with the visually impaired folks in that home. I visited there last summer because I may end up living there myself some day. I thought it would be nice to spend a holiday there and see how I like it. Since I am retired, I am a little lost with not working holidays like i used to but family all seem to be going there own ways so thought I would do something different for christmas.
Bea, that's a wonderful idea
! I think it's great to reach out, and help people during the holidays. What kind of a home is it? Is it a nursing home, or just a place for older blind folks?
Some of the family traditions we have are: on someone's birthday, pushing the person's face in their cake (not like all the way, but enough to get icing on it), and going to my aunt Rosie's for Thanksgiving lunch and standing in a circle before the meal and saying a prayer usually started by Grandpa. We also used to have a gift exchange usually after Christmas Day, where each of us will pick out a name and buy a present for that person, but we don't really seem to do that anymore, I guess because everyone has gotten so busy and some of us were having money problems or something. That also usually used to take place at Aunt Rosie's and occasionally at one of my uncle's houses. My family (my parents, I, and my brothers, and sometimes other family members sometimes still go to Aunt Rosie's on or after Christmas and exchange gifts, but although it's nice, it's not really the same because almost everyone used to go before. All these traditions are/were with my mom's side of the family. I wish we would've continued the gift exchange thing, and I would want to restart that again. I think it was because the amount everyone needed to spend was $20 flat for the person they picked. I would want to lower it to $10 though, because I personally don't think it should matter as much on where it came from (what I mean is you can buy good-quality things even at a flea market or a charity-type place), but that the product is not too cheaply made ( that it will last), and that the person who recieves it will like it.
Every Christmas we eat the family dinner and then we go to hear mass at twelve midnight, this was for Christmas eve and then after going to church thats when we open all our gifts. In New Years eve me and my cousins used to celebrate the coming of the new year by drinking wwine after dinner and then we creat a small bonfire using scraps of wood and old papers we no longer need. We used to do the bonfire in our old house and then after we made the small bonfire, we each write a wish in a piece of paper and throw it in the fire. We also cook hotdogs and marshmallows and chill for the sleep over party. Well, thats about it. When i went here, the only thing we do is have a family dinner during Thanksgiving but thats about it. We celebrate it simple, but fun because you get to spend time with your family.
Lupinsgirl - Tracey,
Ah yes the lasagna for Christmas. For us too, it has became a Family Christmas Day Tradition. Well, for last couple years though let me take that one back for sometimes the lasagna is rather readied on New Year's Day with a ham on Christmas day.
Could not agree with thee more, the comment you made, "...so grab that dancing moose and forget about the fancy goose. Intristing topic."
~*Thunderous MidNight*~
..Tracey, you may call me "Jackie," if ye like {A few others do as well }
Mary bryant home is a place for blind folks to live who are 22 and over. It will be nice to visit there on christmas and since I have orientation problems with taking a while to learn my way around, at least there it's all one level with no stairs and laid out easy enough to get around in. the place is called a supportive living facility. anyway, it is interesting to read all the family traditions on this topic. We have a dish called potato dressing we eat instead of bread dressing with the turkey. it is made up of mashed potatoes and pork sausage. my great grandmother was French and I think that's where potato dressing originated. tastes really good.
We stay at home for Christmas, but one of Mum and Dad's really good friends who they've known for years comes round and stays for christmas eve and christmas day and goes home the day after. Me and my sister go downstairs when Mum calls us on christmas morning and open christmas presents then have breakfast. We don't do much for the rest of the morning, but we usually go to the pub at lunch time and don't get any dinner until about 3/4 o'clock. We have like a roast dinner and sometimes some pudding as well and in the evening, we have a help-yourself kind of thing on the table with things like crisps, crackers ... Oh, we also have christmas crackers to pull at dinner time with little hats and things inside them.