Twenty Six Lists - Holiday Traditions - #twentysixlists

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Welcome to the final installment of Twenty Six Lists! Every other week over this past year I shared a writing prompt and invited you to link up your list. Sometimes we shared very simple lists, and sometimes we elaborated and wrote more. Thank you for reading and thank you to everyone who participated at any time through the year. 

It's time for our final list - a collection of Christmas traditions. These are the traditions that we've continued in our family or have become traditions for us.

List #26 - Christmas and Holiday Traditions

Christmas Tree and Decorating - Some people put up the tree and decorate at Thanksgiving or earlier, some at the beginning of December, and some wait until right before Christmas! And then it all needs to be taken down sometime after Christmas and again, some people have it cleared away on December 26th while others wait until Epiphany (January 6th). Our family has been putting up our tree and decorations starting at Thanksgiving for many years. The truth is that sometimes it takes weeks before it's all done! But on Thanksgiving Day we get everything out and hopefully by the end of Black Friday the tree and the lights are up, and we work on trimming the tree and finishing up decorations over the next days (or weeks if it's a particularly busy year). We leave the decorations up until Epiphany because that is actually the last of the twelve days of Christmas. I make an effort to get it all put away as quickly as possible because one of my sons has a birthday just a couple days later. My husband is in charge of all the lights - tree, outside, everywhere. My daughter and I are in charge of everything else.

Gifts - When I was growing up, we often opened our gifts late on Christmas Eve. Midnight, ideally, but when we kids were younger we did it earlier. Then on Christmas morning we had stockings. My husband's family always got up early on Christmas morning and opened gifts and stockings then. His mom didn't put gifts under the tree until Christmas Eve either - I guess so that it looked like Santa had brought them during the night. So for the most part we have followed my husband's tradition and opened gifts on Christmas morning, although we all love wrapping and putting our gifts for others under the tree and watching the outpouring of love pile up as we get closer to the big day! We usually have the youngest person hand out the gifts, and as much as possible we open them one at a time so everyone can see every gift. I do not like the free-for-all way of opening. 

We also have a goofy family tradition after all the gifts have been opened. We wad up all the wrapping paper and have a paper ball war! When we're worn out, there are hugs all around and then it's probably time to eat!

Christmas Movies - The Christmas season is the perfect time to watch Christmas movies and specials together. I normally don't watch much TV, but I love watching all our favorite Christmas movies as a family. White Christmas, It's A Wonderful Life, A Christmas Carol, The Santa Clause, Elf . . . these are the movies that must be watched in order for it to be truly Christmas! A Christmas Carol is for Christmas Eve, after we get home from the Christmas Eve service.

In fact, right now, my kids and a couple of friends are having a Christmas movie marathon, and I'm about to go make lunch. I hope they've saved a couple of my favorites for this afternoon when I can watch along with them.

See my related post: The Gift of Christmas Traditions

What's on your list? Link up or tell me in the comments!

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