Family Christmas Traditions - What Are Yours?

Most people have a family tradition or two up their sleeves when the festive period comes around. Whether that is something you have carried on from a family tradition or something you have created since having a family of your own, our traditions are what make Christmas special to each and everyone of us.

Christmas is one of my favourite times of year and I think part of that stems from all the effort my mum and dad put in to making it extra special for me and my sister. We had some lovely traditions, some that even stemmed from when my own mum was a little girl, traditions that I now try to carry on with my own kids too!

One of my favourite traditions that I remember as a little girl, and that I still do now with my own kids, was opening our stockings on my mums bed. On Christmas morning me and my sister would pile into my mums room (I dread to think at what time!) and wake them up. My dad would go downstairs to see if Santa had been and then bring us up our stockings full of toys, showing that Santa had indeed been, much to the excitement of me and my sister of course.

We would then opening our stockings sat on my mums bed (whilst my mum and dad had some much needed caffeine intake from their coffee!). Inside our stockings would always be some fluffy socks to wear that morning, chocolate coins and a piece of fruit (and some other bits and bobs too of course). We would then eat a couple of coins and a piece of fruit before heading down to see if Santa had left any more presents.

If I really think about it now I can still feel that warm, fizzy, excited feeling in my tummy as we would walk down the stairs and see all the presents waiting and I think that's exactly what traditions are all about, the feelings and memories they evoke.

One tradition I have started since having my own children is visiting Santa a few days before Christmas. Each year we pick somewhere new to visit Santa and our visits have taken us to some pretty cool places including LaplandUK, Clearwell Caves and many more including visiting him on a train (the Polar Express train ride is one not to miss at Christmas!), at a garden centre and most recently at Cadbury World too!

Its something the kids always look forward too and it always gets us ready for the big day, although I have to admit I am always listening intently to what the kids tell Santa they want in case I need to make any last minute dashes for surprise wants!

I love hearing about all the different traditions that everyone has, and there were some great ones when I asked some fellow bloggers recently which I thought I would share below in case you are looking for some new family traditions!

Rachel from Coffee, Cake, Kids - We do a North Pole breakfast on the first Sunday of December - pancakes, crumpets, hot chocolate and Christmas crackers on the table

Sophie from Soph-Obsessed - We have a hard and fast rule that the youngest family member has to put the star on top of the tree. Its something my mum did when her family were younger and they were very superstitious that if we didn't do it we'd have a year of bad luck. We have carried it on in our house too! 

Emma from Dirt, Diggers and Dinosaurs - Every Christmas Eve our boys fill a box full of unloved or damaged toys and leave them under the tree ready for Santa. He will take them back to his workshop at the North Pole and his Elves will fix them ready to give to children who don't have many toys. We then have a sort through and donate them to a local charity.

Jade from Live A Blissful Life - We do Noche Buena (Filipino tradition) where we all either stay awake until midnight or wake up again at midnight to have an evening meal, sing songs, watch Christmas movies and generally just enjoy time with the family.

Karina from Mum's The Nerd - We bake mince pies for Santa and decorate a gingerbread house every Christmas Eve. We also like to go to garden centres for hot chocolates and to pick out a special ornament each for the tree, it’s lovely to look back and see what we have added over the years.

Do you have any family Christmas traditions? I would love to hear about them so please do share them in the comments below.

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