Amber

Traditions are a big part of our family during the holiday seasons. Since our team takes pride in our families we wanted to share some of our family's favorite traditions. We have so many traditions that we narrowed things down to a few of them.

The Dickens Festival- When I was younger we would go to a The Festival of Trees. After the festival we would put our Santa hats on and carol while passing out candy canes at temple square. This is a place that has a Christmas light on every tree for an entire block. I looked forward to this every year. When I got older we moved and started going to the Dickens festival instead. Everyone at the festival is dressed like the characters from the Charles Dickens Christmas Carol movie. You truly feel like you have moved back to an old English town. Santa Clause at this event is truly the most authentic Santa I have ever seen with a personality you can't find anywhere else. I have pictures of my oldest daughter with this Santa every year of her life. My girls can also dip candles in wax and put their names on Santa's naughty or nice list. This event is fun for the whole family and my family looks forward to the festival every year.

 Making Sugar Cookies- Making sugar cookies has been a new tradition to our family it started after my first little girl was around two. She loves baking with her grandma and mom and kept begging her grandma to make cookies that she could decorate. I will never forget last year my mom showed up to make cookies and brought Santa hats for my little girl and my nephew. So this tradition is not so overwhelming for my little girls, we make the sugar cookies beforehand. I freeze these cookies until we plan with my mom to decorate the cookies. The children pick which kind of cookies they want to decorate. As difficult as it is to see your kids lick their hands and then stick it on the sprinkles they truly love being a part of making their own creations. My Mom encourages their creativity. I keep their cookies on separate plates so they can enjoy their own creations. I also throw out the sprinkles when they are done. (I thought I should tell all of you that, so my friends and neighbors will know it is safe to eat my cookies) I don't give the kids cookies out to your neighbors I decorate some for gifts, as well.

Cutting our own Christmas trees-Christmas has always been a big holiday in our family. Our house would often times win the town decoration contest. Each of our rooms would have Christmas lights around it and we always had our own small Christmas trees. So you can imagine that a real Christmas tree was always a must. Picking out our tree every year was the best tradition especially when we would go into the mountains and cut our own tree. There were several years we had a Griswold experience. I recall one year I found the perfect tree we cut it down and brought it home got it decorated. The tree was gorgeous but it never stopped growing. By the time the Christmas Season was over we had to take a chainsaw and cut limbs off to get the tree out of the house. These are the memories you never forget. I now have a fake tree but the tradition of a real tree has not ended in our family it is simply modified. My dad lives in the mountains and gets us tree tags every year. Over the thanksgiving weekend my dad takes my kids up into the mountains on the 4-wheelers and lets them pick out their own little tree. We put these trees in each of the kid's rooms. We let them decorate the trees however they want and they can put the presents from their friends under their own tree.

Pajama's for Christmas Eve- This is one of my very favorite traditions. This tradition goes back four generations that we know of. Every year on Christmas eve after all the family parties and events ended, just as we were getting ready for bed our parents would get the last glass of eggnog for each of us and pull out presents that had not been under the tree. We knew every year that this present would be pajamas but it didn't matter the excitement of sleeping in brand new Christmas pajama's was the best feeling. One year my parents decided to change this tradition and that is when this tradition became even more important. I was so disappointed that year when we opened another gift instead. As I look back on all of our Christmas's my favorite picture is the Christmas my mom made our Christmas Eve pajamas. My mom, my sister and I all had the exact same pajama. The best part is that they were homemade by my mom.

Keish for breakfast on Christmas morning- This is also a tradition I have been a part of my entire life. Every year on Christmas morning my mom makes keish. I am sure you are wondering what keish is so let me explain a little bit. Keish is an egg filled pie. You take eggs, cheese, ham, and some other ingredients (look under the recipe page for the recipe). When the keish is cooked you can put sour cream on top. We only eat this breakfast on Christmas morning I guess that is probably why we look forward to it every year. Now that we are all adults we still get together on Christmas morning for the traditional keish breakfast. I have ask my mom to give you a history.

History of this tradition from my Mom. When I was a little girl my mother(Amber's gradma) had a Christmas breakfast tradition from her childhood. Her Mother made egg, gravy toast every Christmas morning. My mother lost her mother before she had her family. She kept the traditions from her mother to keep her part of her life. Her mother also made the children pajamas that they opened on Christmas Eve. This tradition was carried on through to my children and they now are carrying it on to their children. Traditions connect us to the past and bound us to our future generations. The Christmas Keish replaced the egg, gravy, toast as my children got older and could voice their opinions. To this day they all love my version of keish, the egg, gravy, toast, not so much. Dianne

I love my family traditions. Please share your traditions with us. contact@mom-stuff.com Amber