Question Of The Day, Sunday, 12/23/18

micknsnicks2mom

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good afternoon! :hellocomputer:

this week, i've been getting things ready for our Christmas! one of our 'traditions' here is to enjoy a quiet day together, just my cats and myself. this means that i get everything possible done ahead of Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.

for today's Question of the Day......



Do you have any Christmas (or New Years Eve/Day) traditions, special things that you do? (can be anything -- special meals or desserts, watching a particular movie(s), staying up extra late, etc)




i'll start!


yup, i just finished the last of things that needed doing today. so now my three cats and i are ready to enjoy a couple of quiet days together.

i've got their Christmas stockings filled, and their new cardboard scratchers unwrapped. i've got plenty of firewood moved, and meals planned and cooked.

and i was thinking today that it's become another of our Christmas traditions, that i bake something special for dessert -- something that i might not normally spend the time to make, and usually a new and interesting recipe! :D this year's dessert was made yesterday, a three-layer carob cake with mint carob chip buttercream. :yummy:


how about you? what Christmas/New Year's traditions do you have?
 

MonaLyssa33

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We don't really have any traditions. The only ones I can think of are that we open presents from youngest to oldest and that we have lefse.
 

neely

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We always binge watching holiday movies on TCM. There's a great line-up starting tomorrow afternoon into the evening so you know where I'll be. :wink:
 

Elphaba09

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We celebrate Yule and the Winter Solstice, as well as our version of Twelfth Night. Technically, we have a Christmas Eve tradition, but that is because we celebrate Christmas with my husband's family and like to cuddle up the night before.

We had our Yule and Winter Solstice celebration last night. Some of our traditions are that I always make bread with turmeric, represent Krampus some way (this year, it was a cookie), everyone gets at least one article of clothing and one homemade gift, and we watch "Elf," "The First White Christmas," "Jack Frost," and "Hey, Arnold!" Christmas special. The night before, after I get the baking done, I wrap gifts while watching the Doctor Who Christmas specials and whatever other Christmas shows that I feel like watching, excluding the ones we save for Yule and the ones my husband and I watch on Christmas Eve. This year, I added the Chilling Adventures of Sabrina's Solstice special. (I really wish there were more Solstice and Yule specials.) We also get Yule crackers (the English Christmas cracker). I make them all and try to keep the jokes more "wintery" than "Christmasy." After everyone else is in bed, my husband and I take a candle and shine it on every door that is closed and in each room that is open.

Our Yule and Solstice usually include my husband, my two children, my soon-to-be-daughter-in-law, my son's best friend whom my husband I claim as our unwillingly adopted son (I say that, but he loves us!), and my husband's sister. (He has a large family, but only his sister comes for Yule and Solstice because she lives across the country and it is one of the days we are certain to see her. Besides, she is our favorite!) This year, we added in my daughter's boyfriend and a friend of my son who could not visit his family this year.

Christmas Eve, my husband and I watch "Nestor the Long Eared Christmas Donkey" and "It's a Wonderful Life" while we drink hot cholate and eat buttered toast. (You were expecting cookies. Nope. Not on Christmas Eve! It is toast to dip into our hot chocolate. Thick cut, homemade bread!. Yum!)

Twelfth Night is celebrated as close to the 6 January as we can manage. I make a large dinner, similar to the one I make for Yule. Then I give silly, cheap gifts and games to my family. We get Twelfth Night cracker. It is one of my favorite days of the year, second only to Yule! We started it after my children and I were homeless for a while and could not afford "real" Yule gifts. I got them sale items and Dollar store toys after the first of the year. (Our tree was a coat rack covered in lights!) It became a tradition that stayed after we found a home.

Fennimore with Yule crackers


Some of our cutouts, including the Krampus for this year



My sweet daughter (glasses) and lovable sister-in-law in their cat pajamas.
 

1 bruce 1

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The big shin dig is always bigger and more traditional (trees, music, good food, bad for you food, etc.) but was a lot of fun. Smaller than normal this year though. :dunno:

Our own holiday is quiet on purpose. The food is good, but kept as simple as possible. We like the idea of a "silent night" :hellocomputer:
 

betsygee

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We don't have a lot of set traditions. Almost none, actually. The one thing I do is stockings. One year when my stepkids were young, I sewed felt Christmas stockings and each of us decorated our own. Since then, I've sewed new stockings as kids got married, and we added cats and grandkids. IMG_9288.jpeg IMG_9287.jpeg

This year we had stockings for hubby and me, the two kids and their spouses, three grandkids, and four cats.

Poor Hannah (cat) got gypped. It was hectic that year and I bought a pre-made stocking (the horror!) :shocked: and just put an 'H' on it. Maybe I'll make her a real one before next year. :lol:
 

Winchester

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Elphaba09 Elphaba09 I love your pictures!
betsygee betsygee Your stockings are adorable!

Rick and I will open one small gift tonight. The rest will wait until Christmas morning. He used to take his mom to church on Christmas Eve, but she can no longer attend church and he attended yesterday, so he won't be going tonight.

I've not seen the ball drop in 47 years. Why? Because Rick and I always kiss the New Year in. That's the most traditional tradition we have. We've done it every year we've been married. I hope we never stop that.

On New Year's Eve, I carry an old purse outside (with one $1.00 bill and some change) and hang it on our front door knob. Right after midnight (after kissing Dear Richard), I go outside and bring it in the house; that way, one of the first things I do is bring money into our house. My grandmother did that and I've done it forever, too.

New Year's Eve is our night for movie-watching. I can't tell you how many years now, we've gone to bed to watch movies. I always make a round loaf of yeast batter bread in the early afternoon. After it's cooled, we slice it horizontally. When we're ready for movie-watching, we'll slather mayo and mustard on both sides, fill it with lettuce, meats, cheeses, tomatoes, etc. wrap it in foil, and throw it in the oven to warm it up, and melt the cheeses. We have our shrimp, sometimes a bit of potato salad, some crackers and dip, and, of course, a wee bit of chocolate. We take it all to bed, and devour while watching our movies. And yes, we really do eat it in bed. With the cats. And The Beast. Tis what tis. We're pretty boring people. And that's OK with us.

Pork and sauerkraut is what we eat on New Year's Day. It's for good luck. Usually over mashed potatoes.

And then we go on diets on January 2nd!!
 
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micknsnicks2mom

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We don't really have any traditions. The only ones I can think of are that we open presents from youngest to oldest and that we have lefse.
i think those qualify as 'traditions'! :D

your family opens presents from youngest to oldest, and you have lefse!!! :thumbsup: those sound like lovely traditions!! :)
 
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micknsnicks2mom

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We always binge watching holiday movies on TCM. There's a great line-up starting tomorrow afternoon into the evening so you know where I'll be. :wink:
you always binge watch holiday movies on TCM!!! :cloud9: most excellent!! :agree:

i really miss TCM! :sigh:
 
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micknsnicks2mom

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We celebrate Yule and the Winter Solstice, as well as our version of Twelfth Night. Technically, we have a Christmas Eve tradition, but that is because we celebrate Christmas with my husband's family and like to cuddle up the night before.

We had our Yule and Winter Solstice celebration last night. Some of our traditions are that I always make bread with turmeric, represent Krampus some way (this year, it was a cookie), everyone gets at least one article of clothing and one homemade gift, and we watch "Elf," "The First White Christmas," "Jack Frost," and "Hey, Arnold!" Christmas special. The night before, after I get the baking done, I wrap gifts while watching the Doctor Who Christmas specials and whatever other Christmas shows that I feel like watching, excluding the ones we save for Yule and the ones my husband and I watch on Christmas Eve. This year, I added the Chilling Adventures of Sabrina's Solstice special. (I really wish there were more Solstice and Yule specials.) We also get Yule crackers (the English Christmas cracker). I make them all and try to keep the jokes more "wintery" than "Christmasy." After everyone else is in bed, my husband and I take a candle and shine it on every door that is closed and in each room that is open.

Our Yule and Solstice usually include my husband, my two children, my soon-to-be-daughter-in-law, my son's best friend whom my husband I claim as our unwillingly adopted son (I say that, but he loves us!), and my husband's sister. (He has a large family, but only his sister comes for Yule and Solstice because she lives across the country and it is one of the days we are certain to see her. Besides, she is our favorite!) This year, we added in my daughter's boyfriend and a friend of my son who could not visit his family this year.

Christmas Eve, my husband and I watch "Nestor the Long Eared Christmas Donkey" and "It's a Wonderful Life" while we drink hot cholate and eat buttered toast. (You were expecting cookies. Nope. Not on Christmas Eve! It is toast to dip into our hot chocolate. Thick cut, homemade bread!. Yum!)

Twelfth Night is celebrated as close to the 6 January as we can manage. I make a large dinner, similar to the one I make for Yule. Then I give silly, cheap gifts and games to my family. We get Twelfth Night cracker. It is one of my favorite days of the year, second only to Yule! We started it after my children and I were homeless for a while and could not afford "real" Yule gifts. I got them sale items and Dollar store toys after the first of the year. (Our tree was a coat rack covered in lights!) It became a tradition that stayed after we found a home.

Fennimore with Yule crackers


Some of our cutouts, including the Krampus for this year



My sweet daughter (glasses) and lovable sister-in-law in their cat pajamas.
you have traditions for Yule, Winter Solstice, Twelfth Night, and Christmas Eve!!! :clap: those sound like wonderful traditions!! :D

awww...your Fennimore laying with the Yule crackers! :redheartpump: very nice photos!!
 

betsygee

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We don't really have any traditions. The only ones I can think of are that we open presents from youngest to oldest and that we have lefse.
I'd never heard of lefse before. I see it's a kind of flatbread. It looks good! How do you eat it--is it a breakfast food or is it for dinner?
 

weebeasties

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My partner and I had our first tree sitting in a corner so all the ornaments were on one side. This caused the tree to be in danger of tipping forward. I grabbed what was handy to weight down the back foot of the tree stand - a bag of dried peas.
So for the last 25 years we have put a bag of peas under the Christmas tree and then I make pea soup for New Years!:lol:
 

aliceneko

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Great to hear about all your traditions and to see all your photos!
We don't have any specific traditions here, though Christmas Day is normally spent at the local pub with my family, including my cousin's in-laws. Before they got together we spent Christmas at my aunt's house with my cousins, grandfather and great-aunt (who were still alive at the time), however since the family have expanded we can't have Christmas dinner at home anymore since there's around 25 of us now at Christmas Day. I preferred the smaller Christmasses at home, but bigger Christmasses are fun nevertheless!
 

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While they were still alive, Michele and I, and the rest of the family would gather at her parent's house on Christmas eve to open presents. IMG_0362.JPG That's Michele sitting in front of the tree, and our niece Jamie trying out her new broom. Picture taken in 1981.
 

Kat0121

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Winchester Winchester I also do the putting the purse outside with cash in it and then bring it in after midnight. I've been doing that for years now.

Elphaba09 Elphaba09 those cat pajamas are everything! Do you know what store they came from?
 

susanm9006

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Mine son and his girlfriend come over and we eat and open gifts. As the years have passed the meal gets less elaborate - this year as we have the last couple, its pizza. It is laid back and quiet Christmas Eve. Christmas day we visit with family, a group of about 23, so lots of noise and food.

When my grandparents, Sicilian immigrants were alive, Christmas Eve was always a meal of homemade ravioli. Then we stayed up and went to midnight mass and came home to a bedtime snack of fried potatoes and sausage.
 

MonaLyssa33

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I'd never heard of lefse before. I see it's a kind of flatbread. It looks good! How do you eat it--is it a breakfast food or is it for dinner?
We typically eat it with butter then add white sugar or brown sugar then roll it up. I have no idea if that is the traditional way to eat it, but it's how my family has always done it.
 
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micknsnicks2mom

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The big shin dig is always bigger and more traditional (trees, music, good food, bad for you food, etc.) but was a lot of fun. Smaller than normal this year though. :dunno:

Our own holiday is quiet on purpose. The food is good, but kept as simple as possible. We like the idea of a "silent night" :hellocomputer:
you have a 'big shin dig' each year, and your own holiday is quiet on purpose!!! :thumbsup: excellent!! :)

i strive for 'quiet' on holidays, too! there always seems to be little things that still need doing, but not the longer list of things that's common for me.
 
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micknsnicks2mom

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We don't have a lot of set traditions. Almost none, actually. The one thing I do is stockings. One year when my stepkids were young, I sewed felt Christmas stockings and each of us decorated our own. Since then, I've sewed new stockings as kids got married, and we added cats and grandkids. View attachment 267787 View attachment 267788

This year we had stockings for hubby and me, the two kids and their spouses, three grandkids, and four cats.

Poor Hannah (cat) got gypped. It was hectic that year and I bought a pre-made stocking (the horror!) :shocked: and just put an 'H' on it. Maybe I'll make her a real one before next year. :lol:
you make hand sewn Christmas stockings for your family!!! :clap: that's awesome!! :agree:

awww, you made sure your Hannah had a stocking too!! :heartshape:
 
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