Holiday Traditions - Riverside,IL

My earliest childhood memories of Christmas always included the annual train ride to the city. We would meet at the train station (it started as my parents, the 6 of us kids, and another family with 4 kids) and we would take the train down to the city. On the train, we would sing Christmas carols (and would delight in the amount of people that sang along with us!) We would walk around the city and look at the lights, "the windows" at Marshall Field's and the big tree. We'd head back on the train and then have dinner together at a local pizza place. After a couple years, as kids got older and families grew, my Dad would rent a bus to take us all down to the city. We'd still sing carols, laugh and have a great time all the way down (I should mention that we lived in the NW suburbs) and upon our return trip my Dad always passed a hat for us to contribute to a little "thank you" gift for the bus driver. After my Dad moved to FL, the bus trips stopped. Recently, we've started the annual trip to Chicago again, riding the train and even giving the day a twist...we do a digital scavenger hunt. We divide the group into equal teams, hand out lists (predetermined by someone in the group and typed out for members of the teams) and then we split up to find the items on our list. Some items include: a picture of your group in front of the big tree, a picture of one member of your group with a stranger in a Bears hat, etc. (You can message me directly for more ideas from our lists.) After a predetermined time we meet for dinner, share stories from the day and try and determine the winner. I have everyone send me their pictures and I put them into a dvd that we all get to see on Christmas. It's been a great childhood tradition transformed...

PS. I've LOVED reading everyones memories and ideas! Thanks, K. for the question and thanks to all for their thoughts!

1 mom found this helpful

A few that I can think of:

An ornament every year - name and date on back. Also, I love buying ornament while on vacation.

I have many small framed ornaments on the tree of different family members, sitting with "Santa" or in a holiday setting. I even have a few old old black-n-whites of my sister's and I around the Christmas tree, when we were kids. I have had many comments on my pictures on the tree as they are so fun to look at.

We play the "present, name game" with the extended family. (sometimes called "The white elephant game", or the "name game".. if you want to know more of what it is.. just personal message me.) Usually we have about 20 people who play.

In my immediate family, we play "Secret Santa" throughout the Advent season. Every Sunday, at dinner, we have to pick one name, keep it to ourselves, and, secretly, be nice to that person all week, even leaving pre-printed 'Secret Santa was here" notes (I have an envelope on the fridge, full of these little slips of paper, so that anyone can take them). From making someone's bed to leaving candy or coins, it's fun to see the creative "kindnesses" that pop up. The next week, we guess who it was - it's great fun to see who was fooled.

My refrigerator becomes emblazoned with old "Christmas photos".

Sunday night during the holidays, is usually appetizer/fireplace night or holiday movie night as a family. Last year, my husband even bought me a new "old" movie that he searched for, for me, and made the kids watch it. And... now.. it's going to be tradition to watch it this year.

My daughter and I spend one or two evenings, baking dozens of cookies.

And, like the rest of the year, we enjoy celebrating the season by regularly going to Church. I can't imagine living in the season without it.

1 mom found this helpful

I agree with the mom who suggested an Ornament every year that is marked with the child's name and year. My own mother did this with my siblings and me. The specific ornament was usually something to do with our lives that year (ie- an ice skate when I was in lessons & a cash register for my first job.)
We've also recently started a new tradition for my 4 year old. The past three years all the ladies of the family (Grandma & Auntie) get together and make Christmas Cookies. We each pick a recipe we like and get to baking! Last year my daughter made the cutest reindeer cookies out of peanut cookies & pretzles. It's always a really fun Girl's Day- but it could be expanded to include the whole family! We're sure to take lots of pictures and Grandma even made a little scrap book thru Shutterfly to remember the moments.

Since the kids were born I have read The Night Before Christmas before they go to bed on Christmas Eve. My kids are older, 19,17,14 and even this last year ALL reminded me to read the story. I think that in the not too distant future, I will be looking for a well illustrated nice hard cover book for each of them as they start their own families. That will be so bitter sweet.

Every year since they were born, my mother bought them an ornament each year. She bought the Hallmark ones with the childs # of Christmas' (1st, 2nd, 3rd, etc.) When she passed away, my son was on his 6th (which they don't make so he got a bus for school), my daughter was 3.5 and my youngest was only 4 days old. I finished off the Hallmark series for each of them and started my youngest on the series. I picked up where my mom left off. Now they get glass ornaments. Since I have been single for almost their entire lives, money has been very tight - always. Each year after Christmas when the sales are in full swing I go ornament shopping for the following Christmas. I buy them at 50-75% off. The cashier will still pack them with great care in nice sturdy boxes wrapped in tissue. I write their initial very small, in a corner on the bottom of the box so I don't have to re-open it. Then, as I pack up the tree and all the household decorations, I pack up the new ornament boxes as well. I won't lose them. On Christmas almost a year later, when the kids open them, I am as surprised as they are because by then I'll have totally forgotten what I had picked out. Then, I take a cardboard "To/From" tag write the kids name and year, punch a hole in it and attach it to the ornament with thin cloth/satiny ribbon which also serves as the ornament hanger. My tree is so packed with these ornaments, we can hardly find room for the ones my aunt bought for me every year since I was young! The greatest thing about this tradition is that I know, without a doubt, my kids will be continuing in their own families years to come.

We would do very different things every year dependant on who's house we would go to I have 15 aunts and uncles and each have their own "tradition". But the one thing I do remember as a child growing up is that the gifts that were from Santa "ALWAYS" had the same gift wrapping. His gifts were always the coolest and I know which were his gifts simply by looking for the wrapping. Once grown up I asked my mom how she happened to find the same gift wrapping every year. She said "Are you crazy! On your first X-mas I just found a wrapping paper with Santas all over it and I stocked up on that to last me say 10-12 years" It's funny b/c when we would go to others home to celebrate x-mas the kids would open Santa's gifts and I would tell them no those were not Santa's gifts b/c it wasn't the correct wrapping. My mom then clued me in that every family has their own Santa paper so he can easily identify whose gift is who instead of wasting time looking for names.
It's not exactly a tradition but thought I would share cause it is pretty cool watching my niece and nephew light up when they would see Santas paper under the tree.

for as long as I remember we have had thanksgiving dinner and then after the dishes were done we all go thru the Friday sale papers. my mom did this when i was a kid. Since I have been married my husband and I have done it. Now my kids are older in college and it has become tradition on the Friday after thanksgiving to all go to separate stores and then meet up for breakfast. We go home take naps and then all meet back at the house to do the Christmas tree. then on the Sunday we all work on gingerbread houses. we work in pairs. they are different pairs each year. But it is something that is done each year. we have now incorporated husbands and girlfriends and now also grandchildren. the kids have never complained about us cutting back on the amount we do gift wise. but if we suggest skipping the gingerbread houses they get upset. After the gingerbread houses are done we display them on the buffet.

When I was growing up my mom did the same cookies every Xmas. I have tried doing the same: the cookie cutter cookies that are frosted. (Very labor intensive but delish) At Easter we visit the same set of cousins in Ohio and the weekend follows the exact same pattern of friday night pizza, saturday afternoon egg hunt, sunday morning mass.

Great question!

We have gone to the Walnut Room downtown at Fields every year since I was born. Then we look at the windows. I have such great memories of this and I can't wait to bring my little guy this year!

Onr thing I do with my kids is buy them a new ornament and new pair of Pajamas every year.We mark the ornament with their name and year. And those two gifts they get to open on X-MAS Eve and hang up thr ornament and wear the PJ'S to bed. They have their own box with their own ornaments and they get to hang them up themselves every year. When they are little you tend to have a lot of ornaments on the bottom of the tree.

I developed our own family traditions which includes taking the family to cut our own Christmas Tree and after that we would order a pizza and have hot chocolate while we are decorating the tree. The kids love picking and cutting down the tree. They also like making Christmas cookies and peanut butter and chocolate balls with me is another tradition. Since our families are bigger now, we exchange names with my parents, my siblings, and my nieces and nephews. The kids have there own drawing with their cousins, and the adults have their own drawing. That way, we don't have to buy Christmas presents for 16 people. we also put a limit on the gifts that everyone agrees to. This helps us spend more for our own children. There is a few ideas that our family does each Christmas.

Two great sources for ideas: familyfun.com and The Book of New Family Traditions: How to Create Great Rituals for Holidays and Everydays by Meg Cox (you can check it out of the library -- I got it from the Joliet library).

My favorite one my family does:
Thanksgiving tree: We have a small green plant pot full of marbles. Each Thanksgiving, my husband and kids go out and find a branch to put in the pot to make a good "tree". That gets them out of the house for bit. After Thanksgiving dinner, everyone hangs a leaf shaped piece of paper on the tree with something they are thankful for written on the paper. We save them all every year so the kids can see what they were thankful for the previous year (my new bike, the toothfairy, etc)

When I was a child, my dad always read 'Twas the Night Before Christmas' to us on Christmas Eve. Now he reads it to my son and my brother's kids. All the rest of us sit around and listen and I have some great pictures of grandpa and the kids snuggled together reading.

Also for Christmas, I make my great-grandmother's homemade caramels and other recipes and my son has really gotten to look forward to helping with them., They are special things that I only make once a year, so it means a lot when we make them.

On New Year's Eve, we all watch The Wizard of Oz and I slow cook pork roast, sauerkraut and sausages and at midnight we eat just a bite for good luck (this is a German tradition) and then have it for a big family lunch on New Year's Day.

We also go to the Walnut room downtown on Christmas Eve for brunch every year since I was born! (Have I seen you in line Stacy =)?)Then we do the windows and the big tree at daley Plaza. The last couple years taking my daughter and husband has really been wonderful for me. When I was a kid we would wait hours in line to sit right next to the tree, now adays they give you one of those pagers and you can shop or go see "Field's" Santa while you are waiting on a table....so nice!

Great question. I can't wait to see the responses you get.

On Christmas Eve, we always ordered pizza. In the middle of all the holiday stress, it was easy for my parents to 'create' the meal and the clean up prior to opening gifts was made easier too.

Another tradition that helped with 'Santa Claus' that I didn't like as a little kid but totally appreciated as I got older was "driving around to see Christmas lights". One parent would figure out where all the cool-looking houses/lights were and load us up in the car to go see them while the other parent would get everything prepared for our visit from Santa.

The only tradition I've established is doing what works on any given year! I mean, we celebrate Halloween by dressing up and going Trick-or-Treating, Fourth of July with fireworks, et cetera. All the geegaws and decorations and whatnot, we do. It's fun.

The actual location is another story. There are too many conditions in our lives that make being in one place every year almost impossible. Our families all live outside of a driving area; there are multiple divorces, remarriages and religions within the family; holidays with my side are, to put it bluntly, a horrorshow. Is it really worth it to spend $1300 for some lame tradition of going to my mom's house for Thanksgiving and getting yelled at? When we get there, are we then going to make ourselves crazy driving to an early Christmas at my Christian brother's family with my Jewish grandparents? The one tradition we did have -- going to my inlaws' farm for Christmas every year -- got scrapped when my FIL died. So, now my MIL comes to Chicago because it's much better for her spirits.

Some people we know find it sad that we don't have an established tradition for the holidays, but it actually works well for our family. We get to make positive holiday memories -- with all the presents and none of the guilt, fighting, or hellacious travel!

My kids are 7 and 10. They look forward to being "santa". When they were about 3 I told them that they could be santa. I explained that anyone who secretly put something in the stockings was santa. Then I took them to the dollar store and gave them enough money to buy one thing for each stocking. We went home and they put on a santa hat then put the things in each stocking. They loved being Santa. And this Easter when the figured out him and the bunny and all they weren't angry or upset cause it was just logical.

Santa has always only brought one present, the rest are from mom and dad.

We always go to Brookfield Zoo's lights thing. And lately we have been spending either Christmas eve or Christmas night at a hotel with a water park.

We just started this one. One of the uncles dresses up as Santa and walks around the outside of the house with his back to the windows like he's looking in the sky. The kids went mad. It was so funny. It helps if it's snowing to help w/the disguise. He also left a letter and bag of $1 toys reminding them to be good and he's just checking in and will be back soon.