With the holiday seasons quickly approaching, most of us become so caught up in the hustle & bustle of events that before you know it, they're all over leaving us wondering, "what just happened & did I do anything memorable with my family"?
For years, I myself have been pondering starting a family tradition with my own children and I've only come up with one. I decided that on Mother's Day, I would have a professional photo taken of just me and my children. Sadly, I have yet to do it. That has brought me to this post. This year, I plan on making a concerted effort to start some family traditions of my own, so that my children and grandchildren someday will look back on those moments and cherish them forever. The problem is, I can't think of any!
I also wanted to post this, knowing there are so many culturally diverse readers who can post their family traditions.
I can't think of a more intimate way of bringing families together than starting or having a tradition!
That being said, please share your family traditions; who knows, maybe your tradition will be carried on through others,........
What a great legacy!
Have an intimate day!
Jennifer
Posts
Pickwick
6 years ago
Many of my family traditions are faith based but we have some great ones. One is that have a day in summer, called Raksha Bandan, that is just for brothers and sisters. Sisters tie protection bands around their brother's wrist and feed him sweets and he gives them presents, vowing to care for and protect them always. It renews the bond between them and ensures that even when they are far away they think of each other.
ReplyDeleteJai
When I was a kid, we had a tradition of taking a family trip to Cedar Point amusement park (Sandusky, Ohio) once per year in the summer. This is an all-day affair that includes a 2 hour drive to get there and a 2 hour drive to get back home. The fun and thrills experienced there as a child still stick with me. And road trips are always a bonding experience for siblings, even if it doesn't seem like it at the time.
ReplyDeleteWe also used to take vacation at Myrtle Beach, SC once per year. From northern Ohio to southern SC is about a 14-hour drive (give or take, when you've got four children who all have to pee at different intervals). We would sleep for most of the first leg. I always enjoyed waking up at 8 or 9 in the morning, looking out the van window, and seeing the Appalachian mountains. So cool.
With funds severely limited now, the only tradition I have with my husband and son is that we have a family dinner every Sunday at my mother-in-law's house. This includes: the three of us (Joe, myself, and Little Joe), Joe's mother, his mother's mother, and his brother and wife. Even though I work in retail, Sundays are off-limits as a "work" day. Sunday is "family day." We don't schedule anything with anyone except family. Sometimes this includes larger family events, such as a backyard BBQ at an uncle's house, a family graduation party, or whatnot, but Sunday is ALWAYS about family.
It's something I've come to cherish, and I hope that my son will look back on it when he's older and appreciate that he had those "family days" on a regular basis.
We used to spend Sunday nights at my grandparents house and I cherish those memories.
ReplyDeleteJennifer, I've been enjoying your blog so much that I gave your blog a Kreative Blogger Award, Check out my latest post to receive your award.
Jai
Thank you guys so much! I love the traditions posted so far, and the award,....well,...I'm speechless! And that's a state, very few people can put me in!
ReplyDeleteOne annual family tradition that I enjoy with my two daughters is on Good Friday and Saturday before Easter. That is when they dye our Easter eggs. We make a "bunny" cake, also. They are completely in charge of decorating it. I always look so forward to this weekend and love to see the smiles on their faces after they have created their "masterpieces".
ReplyDeleteMy husband's family is rich with traditions... my favorite is on Christmas Eve. We make homemade donuts at his parents house with his sister and her kids as well as our own. Santa gets donuts instead of cookies at our houses.
ReplyDeleteThen there is the tradition of the LAMB CAKE! On the baby's 1st birthday their mom, a year after giving birth to this child, has a task far more impossible than pushing out a child's head! It is to make this lamb cake out of a 70 year old cast iron mold!! Some traditions would not be missed...
Hi Jennifer and congrats on the Kreative blogger award! I can see why Jai picked your blog.
ReplyDeleteAs far as family traditions: On Christmas Eve I hide a Christmas pickle in the tree and the girls clammor to find it. Not a real pickle, mind you. A glass ornament pickle. This originated in Germany.
Our girls, two off to college and one in highschool, still love doing this even now. The one who finds the pickle wins a prize. It's not much, Christmas socks and a chocolate orange. Last year Candice charged the tree so hard, hoping to find it first, that I thought she was going to knock it over. She did poke her eye on a branch!
I've enjoyed reading everyones traditions, and hope you find some of your very own.
Not many traditions however, for the last few years on Mother's Day we take a picture of Grandma, Mom and Daughter together. We try to take the same pose at the kitchen table. Really cool to see how Samantha (Daughter) changes over the years. The only other would be Thanksgiving dinner. That is my favorite time of year. Getting the family together and seeing how blessed we are to have each other.
ReplyDeleteCongrats on the award, you deserve it.
Ray
I've had a few, baking cookies for the neighbors, heck their kids have been part of it with mine along with painting Christmas ornaments.
ReplyDeleteNow that they have grown up and some with kids of their own, we have a Weenie and Marshmallow Roast with Karaoke signing crazy games, like…
pin the nose on the snowman / horns on the rain dear / bow on the package
snow ball toss (bean bag only with packing peanuts and not beans makes them really lightweight and very hard to “toss”)
how many rain dear droppings in the jar
carry an ice cube on a spoon relay
Santa says
We sometimes make a small craft item
Have prizes (dollar store genre type)
Reading of the Christmas
I LOVE all of these traditions! The Christmas "pickle" cracks me up! Thank you all so much for your input,...hopefully readers will start making some family traditions of their own that they can pass on to their family for years to come!
ReplyDeleteJennifer