Thanksgiving/Christmas Traditions

[SparklyGirl*]

Hey ladies! I have been trying to think of new traditions to start with my bf for the holidays. In the years that we have been dating we have never done anything that has been something that we do every year that was meaningful.
I want to think of something to do not only for Thanksgiving but for Christmas. I am just looking for some of the things that you ladies do as well as some suggestions. Here are some of the things that I thought of and some of the things that I want to make as a tradition.

Gingerbread House
Get an ornament every year that relates to the two of us
-and then i get stumped on any other traditions that we could start

So here is the anniversary plan tell me what you ladies think:

Our anniversary is on November 22. I was thinking of surprising him by suggesting that we go to a nice restaurant on the 23rd. Since thanksgiving we cant because we will be with his family. And then once we are done at the restaurant give him directions to where we are going next but do not tell him. we would end up going to a church. it will be the church that his grandparents got married in. they got married young and were married for 70 something years. they both dies a few years ago. they were both in their late 90s. So i know that that would have a big emotional thing with him and be very meaningful. He was VERY close to them and he said that his grandfather told him something that he can only tell me when he asks me to marry him. But that could be our thanksgiving tradition/anniversary thing that we could do every year. i just keep asking him for the address to the church but his father cant find it. i dont want him to be wondering why i need it and catch on. is there anything else that i should do along with that? and if we cant get into the church. i guess that i would be fine with just being outside. i guess if we go before dinner then we would be able to or maybe have an early dinner and then go. usually churches are open though, right? i just dont want him to ask where we are going and then have him get mad if we cant find it yah know?

do you ladies have any advice on making this go smoothly also?

And dont forget to mention your ideas about traditions! Thank you!

 

[mirre]

If you know the name of the church you can try to go onto an online "phonebook" type thing and look it up.

At work we use Switchboard.com and Whitepages.com

You can even get directions to it from wherever you''ll be driving from.

Last year for Christmas BF and I bought a gingerbread house kit and I had a TON of candy leftover from Halloween that I wasn''t going to eat so we embellished it a little more than you can with what they give you in the kit. I think we''re going to try to do another one this year... sounds like a pretty fun tradition to me! I''ve seen the gingerbread trees too that I think would be fun.

I have a tradition that I always buy a new ornament for the tree... I did it at my parents and I do it at home now too (except I usually get more than one!) With the exception of last year because I didn''t actually have a tree it was my roommate''s. So getting one that has meaning to both of you would be fun because you could do it together. (I always write the year somewhere on it with a sharpie!)

Good luck finding the church!

Hope you get to find out what his grandpa told him soon

 

[Pandora II]

We always do the tree ornament thing.

We also do advent calendars for each other - and stockings for xmas morning with silly things in.

 

[goodfun7580]

Try googling the church name and city, you might get lucky!

This year my BF and I are going to exchange ornaments before christmas to put on our tree because this is our first christmas living together. We also always exchange stockings.

We don''t have any thanksgiving rituals because usually one of our parents has thanksgiving and we just go there, nothing special, especially since BF doesn''t even eat turkey!

 

[ladypirate]

This year for Thanksgiving we''ve convinced my parents to drive up with us to his family''s house so we can all have Thanksgiving together, which is fun. I love your ideas for the holidays...maybe you could have one of baking cookies and decorating them together on Christmas eve or something?

 

[Tuesday]

My family always had a tradition of allowing each person to open one present on Christmas Eve.

My BF''s family has a tradition that we have adopted as our own. On Christmas morning we bake a quiche for breakfast and all the adults sit around in their pajamas and drink Mimosas. It''s a great way to enjoy a nice, leisurely morning with your family!

 

[SparklyGirl*]

Thanks for the ideas. I like all of them so far!

i would google the church name etc but the problem that i have is that i dont know the name of it! Kind of hard to search for it without the name. i am going to ask bf again tonight so hopefully i can find out soon. I really only need the name of it because if it is in pittsburgh then that should be pretty easy, atleast i hope so!

lol.

 

[SparklyGirl*]

So uh oh. i just talked to B and he said that his grandparents werent married in a church. hmm...

i just hope that they were married someplace that we could get to.

 

[WeightLifterChick]

BF and I always purchase a Christmas tree together. We buy one for ourselves and one for his mom, and help her decorate it while listening to holiday music

Then we do the same at our house, but just the two of us. We also put up the outside lights together on a Friday night when it''s nice and cool outside, and after we''ve had a few drinks

Sometimes the lights don''t always look perfect, heh.

As it gets closer to Christmas, on Saturday evenings we''ll blast music and wrap gifts together. On Christmas Day, after gift opening, eating good food and family stuff, we head to this local residential street that is famous in our area for having great Christmas lights. We stroll the street, take pictures and have a good time.

 

[Laurenj915]

My BF and I make each other one present and exchange it on Christmas Eve. It has to be completely made my hand. Last year he make me an ornament that he carved from wood and painted. I made him a calendar were you pull off a page each day of the year. Each page had one reason why I love him. I can''t figure out what I am going to make this year.

 

[bee*]

My dad takes my whole family and D out for christmas eve lunch and then we all head into town together for some last minute shopping etc. D and I will meet up with his parents in town also and hang around with them for a while and then we''ll all meet for coffee before we head home. I always go to his parents house then in the evening and give presents etc. I just love it. Then normally we''ll see each other on Christmas morning at the graveyard as both our grangparents are buried near each other and we all go visit them on christmas day. Then he comes to mine on St Stephens Day.

 

[Hudson_Hawk]

This is the first year we're actually going to get to celebrate together. Last year, though we were together and basically living together, circumstances beyond our control made celebrating Thanksgiving and Xmas together impossible.

I usually go our to CA to visit my brother FSIL and stepsister/FSBIL, but this year, since it's the first that FI and I will have been together in our house, my parents are coming down and we're cooking for them. Next year we'll go to FIs sister's house and we'll start a alternating tradition. One fam gets Turkey Day and the other gets Xmas and vice versa.

We're going on a family vacation the week before Christmas with FIs family so that's our Xmas with them. We're hoping this vacation thing will become a tradition, but hopefully not a this time every year. It's such a bad time of year for vacation on top of the regular holidays.

For our private christmas, FI and I plan to cut down our own tree and decorate the house. I'm not sure if we'll do presents at home or at my parents house though. We exchange stockings and we do the ornament thing as well.

For Chrismas (proper) we're going to my parents. Christmas at their house consists of last minute shopping on christmas eve day, a big dinner on christmas eve, decorating the tree, wrapping presents, etc. It's a mad house but since we have to travel, we don't always have time in advance to get stuff done. This year we're taking Christmas eve day off and we're going up for the whole weekend. Hopefully it won't be as nuts as it usually is. We open one gift on Christmas eve night and then early in the morning of Xmas day, we do stockings, and gifts, (but not until everyone has at least one cup of coffee in them). My older brother and I have a tradition involving the card we get for our mom. We hunt for the most fitting and sentimental card we can find. Whoever makes her cry wins

Then, we pile into the car and drive an hour and a half to my aunt's house for Christmas brunch. My whole family gathers and we do presents there. Since we're all adults we've instated 2 new traditions. We do Secret Santas and a yankee swap which makes present buying so much easier. Then, we take my little brother to his dad's house (which is nearby) and then my older brother and I as well as our SOs drive 2 hours to my Dad's house for Christmas. We usually stay there for a night and spend time with him, the step mom and her family, and then we go home. Now that I've written this out and I read it I realize we're crazy. I can't believe we jump through so many hoops, but time is short on these holidays and we want to see everyone. But I guess traditions are traditions whether they're irrational or not.

This is the first year FI will be coming along for the ride... LOL should be a fun time. I bet his head will be spinning after!

 

[sunnyd]

Date: 11/7/2007 2:41:21 PM
Author: Tuesday
My family always had a tradition of allowing each person to open one present on Christmas Eve.

My BF''s family has a tradition that we have adopted as our own. On Christmas morning we bake a quiche for breakfast and all the adults sit around in their pajamas and drink Mimosas. It''s a great way to enjoy a nice, leisurely morning with your family!

tuesday my family does the exact same thing! does anyone else hear twilight zone theme music...?

we also have "fashion shows", where all the new clothes can be displayed. this year will be my first with the new bf, could be tricky. i think we''re staying at his parents'' house xmas eve (their tradition no matter how old everyone is), but who knows after that!!

 

[emeraldlover1]

We also do a lot of the things that have already been mentioned but here are a few more:

-Since we live in NYC (you can do this anywhere though)...we go skating in Rock. Center and then take a picture in front of the tree. Its pretty funny to see the difference in our pictures between now and the first year that we did that.

-We also do a "Christmas Stroll" this only consists of walking up and down fifth ave and window shopping but it is fun.

-For Halloween we carve pumpkins and we each have to design a pumpkin that reminds eachother of the other. I bet you could do the same with an ornament.

-We have to buy one gift to exchange that costs less than $10 but it has to be something we want. For example last year I got bf a "under the pillow" speaker that connects to his radio so that he can listen to the Mets station at bedtime.

-We have a Thanksgiving boardgame contest with the rest of the family. We are always a team. Winning team gets to make up winning t-shirts for the next year for bragging rights and gets to pick the boardgame. Its pretty funny.


Now that I think of it, we need more ideas too. Keep them coming...

 

[ladypirate]

I love the t-day boardgame idea! Now if only I could convince our families to try it...

 

[emeraldlover1]

It usually works the best after dinner probably because of the wine consumption. LOL

 

[surfgirl]

Ahhh, Christmas traditions...We get our tree every year from the same family that comes down every Xmas. They have the nicest trees and they set them up in a huge tent, all on stands so you can really know what tree you're buying and every year I say "It's like the Neiman Marcus bridal salon, but for trees!" because they all look so pretty, like brides in big wedding dresses...(okay, so I'm weird, so sue me!). Then I decorate the tree while he watches, amused no end (gotta play old Blues Christmas music while doing the tree). Christmas eve we finish wrapping any last minute presents and on Christmas morning, he gets up early and makes alot of noise trying to get me up but I usually just stay in bed and make him wait as long as possible to open gifts...! Then we have a Xmas morning fire, we make a special breakfast, and then open all our gifts. Then we take photos of the sea of wrapping paper that's all over the room...and we call all our friends and family that are far away to wish them a happy holiday. Then sometimes he goes surfing or we'll take a walk to the beach and then it's nap time because all that excitement is really exhausting! And then I make a special Xmas dinner and we eat by the fire. Just us. No family drama. We like it that way.

Sometimes we invite a few people over for NYE and we put out ridiculous amounts of hot and cold hors d'eurves with some Veuve Cliquot Demi Sec (

) and we hang out and watch the ball drop. Usually we all watch that at 9pm then we say, "okay, we can all go to sleep now, nothing to see here, move it along.." and we are asleep before midnight our time. Exciting folks, aren't we?!?

 

[KimberlyH]

My DH''s parents are both deceased and he has no close relatives, so we spend Thanksgiving with my family, nothing exceptional about it except that my dad has a crazy work schedule so we always end up celebrating on the wrong day.

Christmas Eve we sometimes go to his friends'' house (her family is like a second family to him) and then go to my parents for Christmas, on whatever day it ends up being.

I think this will be the first year that we''ll be celebrating both holidays on the correct day.

We always go Christmas shopping in Chicago sometime between Thanksgiving and Christmas. We got engaged their two years ago on a Christmas shopping trip. We go see A Christmas Carol at The Goodman Theatre, but this year I think we''re going to see Phantom instead.

After typing this all out I''ve come to the conclusion that our traditions are to not do anything the same. Sorry, I''ve not been much help.

One of my favorite family traditions is that we have an Ugly Christmas Ornament Competition every year. We each have to buy an ornament and conceal it in a brown paper bag, then we open them all up and vote which one is the ugliest. I''ve won two years running, I''m going to have to work hard to keep up my streak.

 

[Rosebud8506]

DH and I started the new ornament thingie each year as well.

Last year, we got married- so we have two hearts with our names on it. We met in Texas - so we have a Texas ornament. So this year, I bought a dogbone one with our new puppy''s name on it to commemorate the year we got him. Its just a nice thing to reminice about as you are placing them on the tree.
We also have a lot of nieces from his siblings'' side of the family, and I bought a pickle ornament this year.

I guess there is a tradition that the kids try to find the pickle on the tree and the first one to find it gets a little prize. I thought it was cute, and think they will enjoy doing it since this year they are spending Christmas with us.