Traditions..Part II

I am drawing from my family traditions as well as those that were given to me from my blogging friends. I now have an idea of what I want our Christmas morning to look like.

The 23rd:
*We'll watch Home Alone and sleep under the tree.

The 24th:
*Christmas Eve we'll read "Twas the night before Christmas" while the boys are tucked in bed.

The 25th:
*I am going to wrap up baby Jesus from our manger scene along with a book for children that relays the Christmas Story
*We'll talk about how Jesus is the best gift God has given to us, and then we'll open the gift of Jesus and read the above mentioned book.
*We'll sing "Away in a Manger" (which I am trying to work with Kent on memorizing it) and place baby Jesus in the manger of our nativity set.
*We'll pray and each thank God for something we are grateful for.
*We'll tear into our presents like mad people.
*We'll sing "Happy Birthday to Jesus" with a candle on a donut (somehow I feel that is more acceptable than a cake at 7:30 a.m.)

I'm sure as the boys get older, our traditions will adapt and change. One that I will implement next year is that each child will keep the gifts that they bought the other family members under the tree in their bedroom. Before we go downstairs to the "main event", we'll make a stop in each boys bedroom and there they can pass out their gifts to me, Erik, and their brother. I am borrowing this from a friend T.H., and she said that her kids look forward to everyone coming in to their room, where they get to GIVE rather than receive. I love it.

Whenever I talk about Christmas Traditions, I always have to laugh when I think about one that my mom tried to institute when I was around 16 years old. She told me that because I was the oldest I had to wear a wreath on my head and serve tea and cookies to the other members of my family. I just laughed, and then Sharon (the good daughter and next in line) agreed to do it. I hope my boys don't laugh at traditions I want to have in our family.