Category Archives: 25 Days of Christmas

Day 2: What Christmas means to you

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Day 2

Linking up for Blogmas 2014…25 Days of Christmas. Because I LOVE Christmastime…now if it would only snow!! 🙂

 

When I was growing up, we decorated, baked cookies, had Christmas parties with friends, and did the whole Santa and reindeer thing.  But the highlight for me was Midnight Mass.  We would spend Christmas Eve at my grandma’s with my mom’s brothers and sisters and all of our cousins, visiting and opening presents.  Then we would go home for awhile and try to rest before we went to Mass.  It was actually at midnight, which I’m not sure if many churches do that anymore.  I just remember the excitement, maybe it was just because I got to stay up late, but as I remember it now, there just seemed to be an aura of peace and joy that night.  I would be wearing a new dress, and most everyone at church would be dressed up too.  I loved walking into the church and seeing all the decorations, the huge brightly lit Christmas Trees, the wreaths draped with red bows, and the large nativity that was empty through the advent season up until this night.  People greeted each other with genuine smiles and well wishes.  Then the choir would sing all those beautiful Christmas carols, and for this one night they would add drums and a trumpet.  Even though it was the same Mass we sat through Sunday after Sunday, this night, it was different…special.  At the end of Mass, the choir’s finale was a resounding “Joy To the World,” that you could feel deep in your soul. At it’s very last note everyone couldn’t help but applaud, which was unheard of back then in a Catholic church…but this night was different…special.  We would go out into the still night air, and it would be freezing outside, but you felt warm on the inside, and those occasions when snow would be falling, just made it complete.  I knew then that Christmas wasn’t about the fancy decorations, or the presents, or the celebrating with friends and family.  It was about the birth of Jesus, and having faith in God no matter what the New Year would bring.

Now that I am older and celebrate differently with my family, we still celebrate the birth of Jesus along with all the other things.  But it’s the time when the year is winding down, and we anticipate the New Year and what it will bring.  Even in the midst of the hustle and bustle, it’s a time of year that I feel like I can just breathe for a moment.  Because it seems that during Christmastime everything is good and everyone is happy…it’s different…special.

 

Day 1: Your Favorite Christmas Tradition

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Linking up for Blogmas 2014…25 Days of Christmas…because I LOVE Christmastime…now if it would only snow!! 🙂

I feel that traditions, whether large or small, are very important.  Because when things don’t seem right with the world, or you’re experiencing changes or hardships in your own little world, you can always count on the comfort of home and family with your holiday traditions.

My favorite tradition has to be decorating!!  When I was growing up, my mom loved to decorate.  She accumulated so much stuff over the years that every Christmas we literally had to take down our everyday nick-knacks and replace them with a Christmas one.  One year, she received a Nativity, and from then on, she collected Nativities.  At last count she had 120.  Growing up there was another tradition that my dad started and as we got older, we also joined in.  My mom had a Mr. and Mrs. Santa Claus kissing salt and pepper shaker set in the kitchen on a shelf.  Since my dad was always the first one up, he started this tradition by moving them around.  Once my mom woke up and was making her breakfast, sometimes she would just start laughing because you never knew where Mr. and Mrs. Santa Claus would end up…one kissing the toaster, one kissing another Christmas statue, like Rudolph or an elf.  So then it became a thing to see who could move them first and find the funniest spot. Even when the original set broke, my dad replaced it with another one, and the tradition moved from one house to the next.  That tradition is a bittersweet memory for us now, it’s been two years since my dad has passed away.  But each year our smiles are brighter as we reminisce and share our memories of him.

My daughter has definitely inherited the decorating gene, and has a good eye for it…very HGTV.  My youngest son is just excited that it is almost Christmas, but had fun decorating as well.  Since we now live with my mom, they had a blast decorating the house.  She doesn’t have as much stuff as she used to, and she no longer pulls out all the nativities, but it is very festive, and every room has something “Christmasy” in it.  My daughter is already planning on having a Christmas get together with her friends, where she will serve her homemade hot chocolate.  One tradition that has been somewhat passed down, is the collecting of Christmas items, I have my own collection of snowmen.  I love snow, so it was only fitting to have a snowman collection.  It is so much fun each year to pull out the decorations, because you sometimes forget from year to year what you actually have.  My mom usually adds to my collection, one year she gave me the cutest snowman, that is now my favorite, probably because it also holds one of my favorite candies…Snow Caps!!

The other tradition is a Christmas village.  I always allow the kids to put up the village, usually with my daughter supervising.  With 3 boys, I usually find Clone Troopers traipsing through the village from time to time, I guess keeping it safe.  The year President Obama was elected, my oldest son received a President Obama ornament, he ended up in the village as well, I guess conducting a town hall meeting.

village

I usually like to decorate the first week of December so I can enjoy it all month long, it’s a lot of work, and I really don’t like to think about taking it all down after the holidays.  But it’s worth it to me, it adds such ambiance to the house, and keeps us in the holiday spirit.