Christmas traditions

Day two of the holiday blog challenge: favorite Christmas tradition

The day after Thanksgiving, my parents would always (and still do I think) start hunting for the biggest Christmas tree at Publix. So each time we'd drive by we would look to see if they had trees yet...and then once trees were there, we looked at them to find the biggest, fullest tree. (Kind of sad going from looking for the biggest tree...to having a 2ft fake tree in a tiny little apartment.) And we each kind of had (have still I guess) a special ornament to put on the tree. We used to put up a "village" around the tree, and a train...but now it's really just the tree. My grandparents always put up this super nice village too, in their living room..but now they just put up a tiny village on the fireplace.

When we were little we also used to wake up super early to open gifts...(now we all sleep in as much as we can, haha). My dad videotaped most of these mornings... And we also put on little plays/shows when we were little (until a certain relative was extremely rude one year), and we (well I) used to print up menus for everyone to say what we were eating, along with a schedule for the show. (Kind of crazy, since I do not like any sort of performing or being the center of attention now, haha.)

And, my parents also have one of the advent/countdown to Christmas calendars. It was kind of like this one:

and this one

Each day you add one of the little ornaments (in the pockets) to the tree..

I think I'm going to buy cousins the countdown calendars this year to start a tradition for them, this teddy bear one is cute:

and they have a Santa's workshop one too.

My mom has tried to start a tradition (even though we're older) of getting pictures with Santa..but it hasn't worked out. (It's pretty embarrassing to go take a picture with Santa when you're 20-something, with your parents, at a mall. If it was somewhere else, maybe not as bad.) I don't know if it's a tradition, but I had a Christmas-y party a few times, invited friends over and made a bunch of desserts (and drinks) and then went downtown to drink.

A fun tradition to start, I think, is having kids make ornaments every year.

I think the tradition I miss most (kind of tradition I guess) is going home for 2-3 weeks for Christmas. In the real world, I barely have any time off from work..last year I flew home for 4 days (I think 4, it may have been 3, I don't even know) and this year I think we're driving (which will take up 2 days of the vacation) so we'll be there for maybe 3 days at the most. Ugh. I barely get to see anyone, and I don't get to relax. Time to go back to school? (Or become a teacher?)