More Tradition

Candy Cane Cookies--when I was on facebook, I reconnected with a friend from grade school who asked me for this recipe and told me that these cookies were what she remembered about our house at Christmas.  Mom used to wrap them and hang them on the tree.  In fact, our tree always sported a lot of edible ornaments which made taking it down a bit easier.

So, I think it's safe to say that our family has more than the average number of traditions.  The reason for that is simple--I am a "tradition-a-holic" and am always on the lookout for new ideas to make special occasions extra special.  In fact, some of Frodo Seven's best practices are things I either read about in magazines or adopted from friends*.  Of course, we are carrying on some traditions from childhood as well--though I have relaxed a little in the way we do things.  As a child, I insisted that everything be exactly the same from one year to the next.  I think my parents might have liked to put up the tree a little earlier or maybe change its location in the living room but I wouldn't hear of it** (that must have driven them crazy--so sorry).  I'm not quite so inflexible these days but tradition continues to be an essential ingredient in our family life.  It connects us to past generations and, along with our faith, provides the backbone for our identity as a family.  

Just to illustrate how attracted kids in general are to rituals, I'll share an email my sister Tara sent me this morning.  She said that her son Ryan was at the kitchen counter and out of the blue said, "Do you know what the best part of being at Aunt Alice's was?"  Tara said, "No, what" and Ryan replied, "Washing the feet".  Now, Ryan is five and this visit happened way back in April during Holy Week.   Our feet-washing tradition is something we do on Holy Thursday and my favorite photo of last year's ritual is the one of big brother Brendan washing Ryan's feet.  There was something so tender about it.  The Lauderdale's visit was packed full of fun activities so it really made an impact on me that five year old Ryan remembered the quiet foot-washing above all else.

This time of year is full of tradition for the residents of Casa Doyle--some religious, some simply fun.  We do the Advent wreath as a family each night, we put out shoes for St. Nick, we open the Advent house and this year, we did something new on St. Nicholas Day--we drove around in the dark of night leaving packages for a couple of friends, family and the parish priests.  The idea was to get the kids involved in the family gift-giving we do every year.  And it was a lot of fun.  We rang doorbells and ran and sang Christmas carols as we drove the neighborhoods.  A couple of the recipients suspected foul play and one, assuming the "visitors" were teens up to no good, didn't find their package until the next morning (that was my in-laws--next time I think we'll give them a follow-up call!)  The goal wasn't to cover everyone on our list so we still have more playing Santa to look forward to but we did have a great time and it was enough of a success to add it to our list of yearly rituals.

This year as the season was approaching, I talked to Madeleine about ways to simplify what we do and suggested that we move something we usually do Christmas Eve to a bit earlier.  Her response?  A gasp of horror--"but we always do it on Christmas Eve, Mom".  More evidence that the apple doesn't fall far from the tree. 

More Doyle Family Christmas traditions coming up including one my mom initiated this year!

*As a rule, I avoid borrowing ideas from close family and friends because the point of these special practices is that they be unique to our family.  Of course hand-me-down traditions are shared with extended family and that is wonderful too.

**If you've ever read Icon about Steve Jobs, you know that determined insistence on a particular vision is a trait he and I share.  I obviously need to find a way to make it pay off better!

After Advent wreath each night, we open the Advent House where we find a piece of candy and a note with an instruction for one member of the family.  That person gets to eat the candy and then perform the task.  Examples:  "Mia: go outside and climb the tree", "Sophie: do a funky dance", "Madeleine: play your favorite Christmas song on the piano". 

The first one this year was addressed to Chris:  "pick a song and dance with each of your girls".  That was a lot of fun.