Family Traditions

I am big on family tradition, so when it comes to changes I don't exactly jump at the opportunity. However, without my own family being so new.. Granted, we've been married since 2007, but were apart until 2008. Right up until our son was born, leaving us the past 2 years as a true family unit. We had no traditions. How could we? So, I started trying to develop some of our own. First, we always have a live Christmas tree, no matter how small. Matter of fact, the year we spent Christmas in San Francisco, we had a Rosemary, 1" tall tree. It was small, but BIG on spirit and tradition, with all the fixings of a regular Christmas tree. Lights, decorations, garland, and presents under the tree. I brought with me the tradition of a good Christmas Eve celebration, big dinner, family, etc. My mom brought in her tradition of making soup for Christmas Eve, which may seem strangely different to some people, but we've been doing it as long as I can remember. But, I wanted more.

Ironically, for night-owls, we don't seem to stay up for New Year's Eve. So that part was out. I'm not a big fan of St. Valentine's Day either. That brings us to Easter. I love easter, waking up early to have a nice family breakfast. Which, as a child meant Easter egg hunting followed by eating Malasadas —Portuguese doughnuts. A day of cooking, typically: ham, mashed potatoes, veggies, the usual stuff. But, as Easter traditionally seems to be a day spent eating in our family, of which Jamie doesn't generally partake, I needed to find something else to make our own.

Now, there are holidays between Easter and Halloween, we just don't do much celebrating then. Until.. this year. I decided to introduce a little of Jamie's Canadian culture into our routine. We decided to celebrate Canadian Thanksgiving. And why not?! We can never give too much thanks or eat too much turkey! Our friend came to join us for the event just as he does for our celebrating American Thanksgiving, which made it feel all the more wonderful. Oven roasted turkey —ah, but the twist? Turkey breast cutlets. As it turns out, trying to find a turkey breast wasn't as easy in October. Not to mention, I wasn't too excited to wait HOURS for the thing to cook. Success! It was tasty, took a fraction of the time, and made the experience just as Thanksgiving as the one we traditionally celebrate. Additionally, on the Thanksgiving note, last year we decided to do a Turkey-day rewind. What does that mean? Well, after getting together on Thanksgiving, everyone always has left-overs, and nobody is ready to stop being with good friends or family so we had a redo the very next day. This allows for everyone to do their own thing on Thanksgiving, and still show up at our place the next day for a casual day of hanging out, eating leftovers, and laughs. This turned out to be a wonderful success! I plan on doing it again this year.

Halloween, one of my all-time favorite holidays. Dressing up, trick-or-treating, looking at all the cute kiddies in their costumes, and CANDY! Who doesn't love that?! As a child growing up, I remember my mom baking cookies at Halloween and while we went out to trick-or-treat to the neighbors houses, we also delivered cookies to everyone. Since my son was born we've decided to take up that type of tradition. Last year we made cookies and passed them out while taking him around in his little puppy dog costume, which by the way he hated and was angry at me for making him wear. Nevertheless, he looked adorable! The year before that, I made cupcakes with marshmallow ghosts on top to hand out. This year I believe I will be making cake truffles, it's a lot of work, but so worth it!

Will update as new happenings become family traditions. Until then..
Cheers!

xOxOx
~D