Every family has their own holiday traditions. Some of them are sweet, some are touching and some are spiritual. In my family, most of them are just plain weird. Here are a few:
- Bizarre Gingerbread Party: (Get the story behind this one here!). My grown children and their friends come over and make strange gingerbread people. Everyone keeps their ideas secret and tries to outdo each other. We’ve had Richard Simmons, Mr. T, the Kardashians, Batman… The results are always hilarious.
- The Die Hard Marathon: Nothing screams Christmas like Bruce Willis running around chasing bad guys. At least, that’s what my husband and son tell me. I do make Chex Mix to make the viewing more festive.
- Triple Play: I have to watch “The Shop Around The Corner” (an old black and white movie with Jimmy Stewart) every year. It’s the movie that “You’ve Got Mail” was based on. So, I’ve got to watch that one too, of course. For an added bonus (and, to annoy my husband because they sing a lot) I also watch “In the Good Old Summertime” with Judy Garland which is based on the very same story.
- The Mouse Tree: My granddaughter waits all year (very impatiently) to set this tree up with me. I have a whole collection of teeny-tiny mouse ornaments that go on a miniature tree. She sees nothing wrong with having a tree with only mice hanging on it (neither do I).
- Christmas Cocoa: This one is not really weird, it’s delicious! We began doing this when the kids were young. We’d make a mug of cocoa and add a scoop of peppermint ice cream to the top. The result is magical. The weird part is that none of us like peppermint at any other time of the year!
- Fuzzy Christmas Socks: I buy the girls a pair of fuzzy socks and then the hardwood floor sliding competitions begin! The one who can slide the farthest wins (extra points for form and grace).
- Stuffed Dog: I don’t even remember who started this one. One of my girls wrapped up a ridiculous stuffed dog for her sister. The same dog has been passed back and forth ever since. The stuffing is coming out and the poor dog is pretty ratty looking, but that makes it even funnier when one of the girls opens it on Christmas morning.
- Charlie Brown Christmas CD: When the kids lived at home, I would get my CD out on December 1st and play it on repeat all day, every day until Christmas. To this day, whenever I play it they groan and yell, “Stop!”
- Kamikaze Lawn Ornament Attacks: My husband and I like to sneak over to our daughter’s house and put bizarre Christmas decorations in her yard! Last year it was a wooden donkey with candy canes in its saddle (this year, a light up snowman – shhhhh!)
- Gingerbread House: Every year we decorate a gingerbread house on Thanksgiving. It’s displayed sweetly on the table until December 31st, and then my son blows it up with the New Year fireworks (please note that I have no young children in my house and please don’t try this at home).
These are just a few of our crazy holiday traditions. They seem perfectly normal to our family but I imagine they sound bizarre to other people. What are your not-so-normal holiday traditions?
