Christmas time is a special time in the Brown household. My girls get so excited because we have several family holiday traditions that we have stuck with their entire childhood. We always adopt a family with the help of our church and try to make their holiday special, we say hello to the ever popular “elf on the shelf”, we make chocolate covered pretzels for teachers, mailmen and bus drivers, we display our manger and place our Santas, Carolers, and wreaths in all their designated places. Once it gets cold outside, the girls get psyched because they know what’s coming and it’s been that way their whole lives. It’s so special to have holiday traditions. They hold so many dear memories and make you realize how fast time flies when you think back on the years we have done this before. (Seems like only yesterday, and here we go again!) I’ll share my two faves with you…

1. Ornaments... Every summer I steal a day to myself and go shopping on the OCNJ Boardwalk and pick out a special Christmas ornament for each of my girls. The ornament has to have something to do with their previous year. When my girls were little and obsessed with princesses, they got princess ornaments. TV characters, hobbies, sports… whatever is the favorite of the year goes up on the tree. I always personalize it with their name and the current year and when they are ready to move out….( I know that’s just a horrible, sick, thought, but let’s face it… it will happen one day), they will have a box of ornaments to take with them that sums up their whole childhood. They will be leaving with a plethora of ornaments including soccer, basketball, and volleyball players,swimmers, surfers, piano players, Michael Jackson (that was tough to find), gymnasts, artists, Scooby Doo, Dorothy… oh! just the thought of their boxes makes me tear up. Every year, when we decorate our tree, the girls go for their special box. They enjoy going down memory lane and decorating the tree with, well, their childhood… it’s so cool! Every Christmas Eve, after church and celebrating with cousins, aunts, uncles and grandparents, we gather around our tree (just the five of us) and the girls open their new ornaments. We take pictures and hang up their special ornaments and have some special family time. (That’s what it’s all about, right? pssst…. it’s not the hokey pokey! LOL) 

2. Mimi’s Cookie Party… Every December, we pick a weekend day where we get dressed in our holiday gear, gather at Mimi’s (my mom’s) house and decorate gingerbread houses and cookies.

We listen to music, eat lunch, play christmas bingo, take turns decorating a side or roof of the gingerbread house, (the adults may have a Bloody Mary …or two)… and we decorate sugar cookies with icing and whatever is leftover from our gingerbread house loot. We put names in a hat and pick two lucky winners to take home the gingerbread houses (which are always fab!!!) and we vote on the best cookie of the year. The lucky winner gets a two dollar bill and a picture for the archives with the winning cookie. This is a super fun day for cousins by the dozens, aunts and grandparents. Our hope is it is a tradition that will carry on for years to come and our grandchildren’s grandchildren will be winning those two dollar bills…

What are some of your holiday traditions??? ( In T -20 seconds, you will be launching them again!) We’d love to hear from you!