Christmas Traditions

Growing up in San Diego, despite the lack of snow and cold weather, Christmas was huge in our home. My mother had boxes and boxes...and boxes of Christmas decorations where it became a week long process to get everything out. The tree always real and a noble fir. The presents spilled out from under the tree and stocking about to bust at the seams. We never went to church, so as a kid, I loved being showered in gifts and put my wishes and hope in a jolly man named Santa, but it always distracted from the real gift.

  As fun as these traditions were as a child, our own family is much different. We are simple with the decorations (this year we removed all of the animated singing plush toys for sake of keeping our sanity with puppies barking Merry Christmas and Elf's dancing;p)
  We want it to feel like a celebration for our kids, and we have a blast decorating a few areas of the house. We bake cookies for our friends/family and the kids get very hands on with the sprinkles and icing. Our cookies may be messy, but the kids love to contribute.

  How about presents? The first few years we did what I knew as a kid...swamped them with gifts. As the years passed, we realized we were taking away from the real celebration and what our kids need more than anything in this world is our love and grace. After traveling to Haiti in 2010 and experiencing one of the poorest cultures in the world, our yearly tradition for the past 3 years is now this: One Want, One Need, One Wear and One Read. This applies for each of our children and works really well. There is a lot more breathing room in the time leading up to it, during and after. We focus on our pajama cuddling, getting out our nativity scene on Christmas night and talking about it and how we can serve others.  Since Fred and I have been married, Christmas night we drive around and find a family eating out somewhere and anonymously purchase their meal. Now our kids are old enough, they help us choose the family.

  The last tradition in our home is our ornaments. Each of our children has their own mini tree and they get to choose and ornament each year to add to it. We date the ornament and make a special moment of it being added to the tree. My mom also sends one ornament for them each year to celebrate a milestone they had during the year. Fred and I have our own tree that has special ornaments from moments in our lives together, first home, first Christmas together, etc. We have a family picture ornament we add each year as well.

   What do I want for Christmas this year? I get it in 9 days! I will be traveling to Haiti to deliver shoes to orphans all over with Soles4Souls.

  Blessings to you and your family for a Merry Christmas, I hope your time together is the best gift you get.

Warm Regards,
  Maggi Thorne
Mrs. Great Plains International 2014