Happy 2007

Pat Rice checking in for 2007!

This is what happens after a long vacation--I forget what day of the week it is! Mea culpa for being late today.

Loretta has suggested that the wenches discuss traditions, but in my traditional manner, I have no traditions, <G>  unless one counts voluntarily moving from one house to another on an average of every three years a tradition. We were obviously meant to be nomads.  And one thing wandering teaches us is to adapt readily to one’s surroundings, so traditions really don’t have a lot of time to develop in our family.

When the children were young, we did our best to have live trees that we decorated with homemade ornaments because my penchant for gorgeous glass does not work well with children in the house.  Balancing the Christmas morning opening of presents against the need to drive for four hours to eat the traditional Christmas dinner with our families, and both families wanting us to arrive on Christmas Day, required a LOT of adapting.  So each year was juggled differently.

As the kids became teenagers, we lived in houses with two story ceilings perfect for twelve-foot trees and my adoration of beautiful ornaments.  Dragging a stepladder out to place delicate ornaments twelve feet above our heads didn’t last long.  The trees were lovely and impressive and we keep them in our photo album these days.

Now the kids have grown up and moved to the far corners of the earth, and Christmas Day can be spent in Costa Rica or California, or sometimes, even with us.  (Will someone please explain to me why my generation had to travel to visit parents on Christmas, and now, instead of our children visiting us, we’re still the ones traveling on Christmas Day?)  Any traditions these days involve how to get gifts through airline security.

And, you know, I’m pretty cool with being traditionless.  It means I don’t have to put up a tree if I don’t want to, or one of the kids saying “remember when we did….?” Followed by us repeating whatever that fun pastime had been (usually food is the memory most fondly recalled—real eggnog, spicy coffecakes, homemade cinnamon rolls, and lots and lots of cookies).  So instead of being traditionless, we actually have decades of varied traditions to carry on as needed under whatever the circumstances we’re in that year.

I know our family is pretty weird in being so nomadic.  How many of our readers prefer to stay in one place? How many of you prefer to explore? And---how many of you who prefer to stay in one place ended up traveling instead?!

Comments

[maryjoputney]

I admire nomads, but I much prefer staying put! The holidays are stressful enough without having to pack everything up sit around airports. Driving isn't so bad, if it's only a few hours and NOT down I-95.

I do like having a tree, though. It wouldn't seem like Christmas otherwise.

Mary Jo, trying to think of any rock solid Christmas traditions in her family, and nothing coming to mind....

[Maggie]

I grew up in one house until I graduated from college, but my husband and I have lived in six states in I can't remember how many houses! I think I get a little antsy staying in one place (and face it, the only time the house is really CLEAN is when it's just been moved into). We moved into this house in June. The packing and unpacking is not as much fun, though, and we hire prof movers now instead of the trusty U-Haul.

We too schlepped four kids for years to see their grandparents in Maine and New York. I've already told my kids we'll come to them when they have young families, cause I remember vividly the semi-horror of traveling with all of them in the van. I had to sit in the middle row so I could maintain order and reach everybody with a mother's gentle (?) touch.

[Sherrie Holmes]

From Sherrie:

In my family, we had this truly hideous pea soup-colored plastic flower someone used in place of a bow on a Christmas present. We all laughed over how ugly it was. It went home with the recipient, and the next year that awful monstrosity appeared on my sister's present. There was much laughter, and she took it home. The next year it appeared on my present. The year after that, I put it on Mom's present. And so it went.

We passed that ugly thing back and forth in our family for many years, until it became so old that it basically disintegrated.

We had many a belly laugh over that flower, and much speculation and enjoyment over seeing who would end up with it next. It was so incredibly ugly, and over the years it just got uglier as it became more decrepit. We mourned its demise when it finally fell apart.

[Kathy Kremer]

Since both sets of parents lived within an hour's drive we didn't have to travel much for Christmas. However, eating 2 enormous meals for both Thanksgiving and Christmas got to be a hassle (not to mention a problem for the waistline), so we decided to see one family on Christmas Day and the other on Thanksgiving. Since we've always been in the choir and had to sing at least 2 services on Christmas Eve, we could never go out of town anyway. Our Christmas traditions have more to do with menu than anything else. We began having pears, pumpkin bread and cheese grits for Christmas morning before the babies were boen, so they thinik that's how it's supposed to be.

[susanna in alabama]

We don't have a lot of traditions in our family, other than everyone descending on my parents' house. The most rock solid one, I suppose, is that we have roasted pork tenderloin with apricot nectar glaze/sauce every year at the family dinner.

A few years ago I started a tradition with my little nieces - making a gingerbread house each year. Right now they're 6, 4 and 1, so it's nothing fancy but lots of fun. They mainly decorate. One thing I like about that as a tradition is that it can morph as they grow up - getting more complicated, encompassing differing concepts of "house". I'm sure at some point we'll do something weird that's not a house at all. But it will be gingerbread! It's also great in that it can be adjusted as a project to include 2 or 20 people, depending on who wants to be involved. I just want the girls to say, when they're adults, "Christmas isn't Christmas without a gingerbread concoction!"

And yes, we usually eat it as soon as we've taken photos.

[Patricia Rice]

Totally with you there, Maggie, on the house only being clean when you move! Or redecorate. That's always a good way of getting it done. "G"

It's interesting that many of us have food as a tradition. The holidays do seem to be very food related. Works for me. I'm not much into fasting, no matter what my upbringing!

I love the gingerbread house tradition! Wish I was so talented. Do you have a blog where you can post photos?

[Edith]

An Edith at rest tends to remain at rest. But my children keep moving, and so then, alas, must I.
Sluggard by nature, nonetheless it's important for me to be with them on the holidays, so I move myself to see them when I must.
Gone are the days of "over the hills and through the woods to Grandma's house we go."
Now it's "through the airport and to the cab to the children's house we go."
But whatever,so long as we're together.

[susanna in alabama]

Pat, I don't have copies of this year's photos yet - long story, but they're on someone else's camera - but I do have a photo posted on my now-in-hiatus blog of the 2004 version. A bit more upscale than this year! Here it is:

http://bias.blogfodder.net/archives/2004_12.html

As you can see, it's very simple. That's the way I like it! Although I did make a (very simple!) version of a castle once.

[Patricia Rice]

What a fantastic gingerbread house! You're very creative. I would never have that much patience.

your blog wouldn't let me comment over there, but thank you for sending the location!

[indomanx]

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