Many of my childhood memories revolve around traditions. Every Thanksgiving my dad would make cinnamon rolls out of the leftover pie crust. Every Christmas morning my brother, sister and I would look for clues hidden around the house in search of a special present. We spent our summer vacations at the same little motel on the gulf coast of Florida.
My parents thought creating memories were more important than stuff, and I am thankful they instilled that same desire in me. Stuff breaks, gets lost, or is forgotten. Memories last a lifetime.
You don’t have to be rich or even comfortable to start creating family traditions. Start simple, you could watch the Macy’s Day parade with the kids while eating a special breakfast. Make a pumpkin pie together, or little turkeys out of pine cones or paper plates.
It doesn’t matter what your tradition is, what matters is that you create traditions that can be passed from your children and then to your grandchildren. Fifty years from now your children will not remember what toy they received for Christmas or how much food was served on Thanksgiving day. They will remember the napkin ring craft or the turkey made from their hand print. They will remember you letting them help you make the pumpkin pie every year, or that on the Friday after Thanksgiving you all hiked through the woods to find the perfect Christmas tree.
For our family, Thanksgiving is the start of a month full of traditions. Over the past several years we have purposed to spend Thanksgiving with friends, near and far. Recently my husband has started the tradition of hunting on Thanksgiving morning. The boys look forward to being old enough to accompany dad on Thanksgiving Day. We have continued my family’s tradition of making pie crust cinnamon rolls, and we cut down our Christmas tree Thanksgiving weekend.
My children look forward to these special events, and talk about them with great anticipation. Many of our family traditions cost little or no money (not the hunting tradition!), but the benefits are invaluable. Each year we create new memories for our children and traditions for them to pass on to their children.
Our Frugal Traditions
Spending Thanksgiving with friends
Creating a fun Thanksgiving craft
Finding the perfect tree
What memories are you making with your kids?
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I love the christmas pancakes!
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Our little guy will be 4 in February and we started this tradition before he was even born. Every year, a week or two before Christmas, we take him to pick out his own special Christmas ornament. I know this isn’t very frugal, but we would go to Hallmark to get the ornaments. I have a “baby on the way” ornament and baby’s first Christmas ornament. After that he started picking his own.
The idea is that when he is old enough to be on his own, he’ll have enough ornaments for his Christmas tree, and they’ll remind him of his family
We hope to continue this tradition, this being our first year at a small base in England!
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Serenity Reply:
November 21st, 2009 at 8:50 am
This is brilliant! I am going to start this with my kiddos, ASAP!!!
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I love family traditions Toni. Love the pancake idea and you kids are so darn cute. Cora is going to have a great time this holiday, she is big enough to enjoy it. I have thanksgiving crafts and stuff for the kids this holiday. Cant wait.
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How hard is it to get the snowflake pancake OFF the sheet without breaking it?
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Sounds like fun Holiday Traditions! I love your Christmas Pancakes. We are getting ready to decorate Christmas cookies. We also take an annual Christmas photo with the kids.
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A tradition I remember as a kid was every year for valentines day my mom would make a heart shaped meatloaf. She would then surround it with mashed potatoes and those with peas. I guess it is something her mom did every year and now my mom and her 6 siblings do with their families. I have continued that tradition with my family. It is so random but kinda special knowing that this little tradition is shared by so much of my family.
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We have a Thanksgiving tablecloth. Everyone writes what they are thankful for ON the tablecloth. We pull it out every Thanksgiving. It’s fun to look back over the things we wrote and the way the little ones’ handwriting changes over the years. If we have family or friends over, we have them write too. If the kids are too little to write, we let them draw and/or write what they tell us.
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One of our kids’ favorite traditions is sleeping in sleeping bags around the Christmas tree on Christmas Eve, so they wake up on Christmas morning right by the tree. The kids have done it long enough now that they talk about it long before Christmas comes around.
We also always get a real Christmas tree. When we lived in Michigan, we always went to the same place, a man’s home where he had a field of Christmas trees. We went 8 or 9 years in a row. Now that we live in Arizona, we have to buy one from a lot, but it’s still fun.
A “new” tradition we started two years ago when we moved to AZ is putting out luminarias on Christmas Eve. The white paper bags and tealights are pretty inexpensive, and it’s so beautiful to see them twinkling in the dark on Christmas Eve!
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We just made those little oreo turkey thingies the other night at scouts. Fun AND delicious.
We have a tradition of celebrating St. Nicholas Day, which is very big in Germany (where ds was born and where we live once again). We put up our tree on St. Nicholas Eve (Dec 5) and put out a special St. Nick stocking (the thought of putting candy in his shoes, which are gross makes me queasy). On St. Nick Day he gets his stocking in the morning and then we go do our Angel Tree shopping.
Dh and I have a tradition on Christmas Eve that we’ve been doing every year since we first got married. In the evening, we turn off all the lights, save the tree, make hot chocolate (with extra marshmallows) and watch Holiday Inn (Best.Holiday.Movie.EVER.) with Bing Crosby and Fred Astaire. Sometimes we’ll watch Going My Way afterward, but now that we have ds, we usually have to spend that time putting together some toy or other. Once ds is older we’ll let him stay up a little later and watch it with us (he loves old movies thanks to his mommy).
On Christmas morning, we play holiday songs while we open presents. After presents we have apple pancakes and then play with whatever toys he got. When we’re in the States we watch the Very Merry Christmas Parade, but over here we have to wait until afternoon.
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The pancakes are awesome!
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On Thanksgiving morning we make elephant ears as a family. They are cinnamon rolls, rolled flat, dipped in more butter and cinnamon sugar, YUM!!!! I try to get all my cooking done the day before so we can make elephant ears and then watch the parade
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Would you be willing to share that recipe for pie crust cinnamon rolls? I’m dying to know how you make them!
Blessings to you and yours!
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TheHappyHousewife Reply:
November 21st, 2009 at 1:05 pm
yes I can post it next week…
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Thanks for sharing! I don’t have kids yet but my family is shifting our focus this year away from commercialism and toward making memories. We’re doing a ‘holiday hands’ theme – instead of new, storebought gifts we’re doing something ‘hands-on’ (an experience together), ‘hand-made’ or ’second-hand’ (from thrift store or our own hosue) for each other. I’m really looking forward to it!
Growing up, our traditions included making the same cookies and listening to the same Christmas albums every year, going downtown (Chicago) to see the department store story-windows decorated, and driving to the affluent neighborhoods to see the elaborate light displays.
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Love all those ideas!
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Love reading all the traditions. We dont really have anything in particular we have stuck too, but am looking for some to start with this year!
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On Christmas Eve we open two gifts, PJ’s and an ornament. The girls are teens now and have quite a collection of ornaments to start there own tree. I try to buy ones that reflect the past year of their life. The PJ’s are worn to bed, and are great for all those Christmas morning photos!
On Christmas morning the girls are allowed to open their stockings right away, and then we eat Daddy’s homemade cinnamon rolls with fruit salad. Then we open gifts, one at a time. Each person going to the tree and finding a gift they have bought and giving it. Then the person who recieved the gift gives the next gift. It is fun and meaningful.
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I don’t have children, but my SIL does this, and I think it’s so sweet. Every year at Christmas she sews a jingle bell on my nephew’s stocking. Hopefully someday I’ll be doing that for my children.
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