TRADITION!

There’s a whole song about it in Fiddler, one of my favorite musicals. It’s a big word, especially in my family. There is just something about Christmas that brings it to the forefront of everybody’s mind. I know people that are hedonistic and all kinds of nasty 363 days a year, but come December 24th and 25th, their butts are in the pews of the most conservative churches, why? TRADITION!

One of the most difficult parts of tradition? Breaking from it. Anyone who has recently been married or had kids knows that the inevitable breaking apart from ones family, into one of your own, causes havoc during the holidays. My family is no different, and probably in many ways, worse.

I was able to cajole my husband and daughter into doing holidays “my way” (translation: my sister/mothers way) for the first 3 years of our lives together. This was due mostly to the string of really great excuses I had for him.
“it’s the babies first Christmas, my parents are so far away!”
“My dad’s sick honey, my sisters need me”
“My dad just died honey, my sisters need me”
“I just…want to….” And that was the year he didn’t let me get away with it. Last year.

So last Christmas I spent my first Christmas not waking up with my little sisters. (who in all fairness, are 21 and 18 now) Opening our stockings, watching 6 straight hours of A Christmas Story while gorging on melted chocolate. (Someone inevitably leaves their stocking too close to the fire place)

I did not make the Christmas afternoon trek to my Aunt Ferols house for dry turkey. I did not make the day after Christmas trek out to the Hood Canal to see my Grandma and open the presents my aunt bought for her to give us.

It was totally different, totally wrong, totally un-Christmas, at least that’s what I would have said on Christmas Eve while I was NOT enjoying the traditional cocktails and bagel bites my mother provides for us.

Honestly, it wasn’t so bad, but it was really hard. We had just lost my dad the year before, and as I mentioned, we are big on that word: TRADITION! I felt like an essential peice of not only my Christmas, but that of my sisters, was missing.

When I woke up in my own house with my own kid and my own husband, I watched my movie. It wasn’t quite as good without Missy screaming at Rachel in the background that she’d ruined Christmas, or without Rachel yelling up the stairs at mom and dad to see if it was early enough to open our Santa presents, but it was still a great movie. I did cry a little in the morning when I called my sisters to compare loot and found that they had been rousted from their normal spot by our mother’s new roommate and made to go back to bed. (so lame)

We did make it down to my moms that night, and though it wasn’t the same, in some ways, it was better. The morning was quiet, the focus got to be on the Pink One, and my husband and I got to snuggle a little bit longer before the kid got up to tear open her gifts.

My little family is now on the cusp of our second “just us” Christmas morning (not just us all Christmas, THAT ain’t happening) and we are now starting to form our own traditions.
Such As:
1) Lily gets to open 1 present on Christmas Eve, a big no-no in my family that always bugged me they are always new jammies to wear for Christmas morning

2) Big Christmas morning breakfast. Breakfast back home was always leftover bagel bites from the night before

3) Christmas Eve with my in-laws and Steve's aunt and uncle who are really fun! At least, were trying that this year

4) Not having to hear my youngest sister complain about watching Lily open her “mountain of gifts” while she “only gets 3” (that I definitely don’t miss)

5) Lounging about in our jammies until mid-day then trekking to my mom’s instead of my aunts to do Christmas all over again.

We’ll come up with more I’m sure, I’m working on an ornament type thing, I’ll let you know how that goes. I know that most Christmas’ won’t be as hard as that first one with out my dad, or that first one at home without my sisters. I know that I only have good memories to look forward to. That, and new TRADITIONS!