'Twas the night before Christmas

Christmas Eve is magical, and I am looking forward to this time next year. At that point my husband and I will be sharing the holiday with our new child and developing traditions for our family. We each have wonderful Christmas memories from our childhood and will truly enjoy passing that on to our little one.

What are some Christmas Eve traditions you grew up with or have since started with your family?

Comments

[christine]

My partner and I have started a tradition of watching Its a Wonderful Life on Christmas Eve. I adore that movie and it really gets us both into the holiday spirit.

[Kat]

My son (9yo) is soooo excited for this day to arrive! We save building our gingerbread house for Christmas Eve. My son also gets to open one present, some time during the day. He's already scoped out which "small" presents he wants to choose from (you have to save the "big" ones for Christmas morning, you know!). We also usually have new pajamas for all of us to wear tonight, so that we look cute in our Christmas morning pictures. We don't live near family, but we make it a fun day full of traditions of our own.

I think I'll add "It's a Wonderful Life" as a tradition too, seeing Christine's comment above - we just got it this year for our DVD collection.

[Kylie]

when i was younger, we were able to open one gift on christmas eve, and it is now something i do with my kids ... same as Kat, it has to be a "small" present :o) I like the tradition of new pyjamas on Christmas Eve too!

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[quiltgirl]

We do the PJs on Christmas Eve... and my mom always recited "Twas the Night..." by Clement C. Moore to us, but I use a book (haven't got it quite memorized yet). And we make cookies for Santa and treats for the reindeer. Did you know Santa likes Diet Coke instead of milk? This year I think we are going to make ornaments out of photos from the past year for our tree. this could become a tradition. We did gingerbread houses this year, too. And we always cut 6-pointed snowflakes: http://carolfrog.blogspot.com/2008/11/how-to-make-six-pointed-snowflake.html

[quiltgirl]

my latest blog post has a picture of my son with his snowflake... along with a plea about cameras:
http://mikeandrindy.blogspot.com/2010/12/fancy-schmancy.html if you wanna check it out.

[christine]

Quiltgirl...Santa in the UK is given mince pies and whisky.....I think your diet coke idea is much better. ;)

[Anika]

Lovely post.
Pjs, a NY breakfast in TN, and just brought Santa into our almost 2 year old daughter's life...it's such a sweet time to be a part of her life. Merry Christmas.

[slmnontec]

We wanted Christmas to be Christ-centered so I made felt ornaments for a special tree in our family room. Each ornament represented another name for Jesus --like shepherd, king, light of the world. Devotions w.ere all the more special by candlelight

[Cherie]

We spend Christmas Eve at a family church service, then with my parents - as a kid we always went to my grandparents for a big family celebration on Christmas Eve too. The kids open a present - always new pjs.
Then Christmas day is just our family - opening gifts, playing, watching some movies, playing some more and and eating too!

Love this one from a couple Christmas Eve's ago
http://www.flickr.com/photos/colopyfam/3144099508/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/colopyfam/1479480524

We always take a group picture on Christmas Eve
http://www.flickr.com/photos/colopyfam/4224405572
http://www.flickr.com/photos/colopyfam/2147409285

Merry Christmas!

[Brittney S Holland]

Christmas Eve at the Holland house? Our tradition is to spend Christmas Eve celebrating Christ's birthday, to remember and reflect on that Truth for us, before the gift-getting frenzy.

We bake a birthday cake and decorate it with icing and sprinkles. We put a candle on it and light it and sing the "Happy Birthday" song to Jesus. We read the Christmas story narrative from the bible. Then...we read "'Twas the Night Before Christmas," and my children open one, small gift.

[Robin]

Simnotec I love your idea! May steal it for next year! Do you have any pics you can share?

[Dawn Camp]

We let the kids open a movie at bedtime on Christmas Eve. When they wake up on Christmas morning, they watch the movie before getting us up to open the rest of the presents. The kids enjoy the movie and it buys tired parents some extra sleep (since the kids get up really early on Christmas). :)

[Michelle]

We usually do some last minute wrapping with the kids to Charlie Brown Christmas music (which requires some Peanuts dance moves.) Then we drive through the especially lit up neighborhoods before bed. After the kids are asleep, my husband and I have always had an assembling/wrapping session to whatever marathon is playing on tv. Strangely, I now have a special place in my heart for The Planet of the Apes movies because of this. However, this is the first year that we're either more prepared with the wrapping or the kids have outgrown assembly required :( But we'll enjoy the time together, just the two of us anyway.

[Mary Amm]

Stockings! We always had them when we were growing up, but my husbands family did not--so we blended the tradition in to our blended family and now I start about a week ahead of time wrapping the little stocking stuffers for our family members. Even grandma in Florida gets one! Lol, its lots of fun.

[tara]

I've been wanting to do new pajamas every year ... maybe someday. An old boyfriend's family always gave new underwear -- so funny to get underwear from your boyfriend's parents! I LOVE the idea of opening a movie for the kiddos to watch in the morning -- I'll have to remember that for when mine are a bit older.

My own family's Christmas Eve tradition is totally accidental. Every year my mom wanted to create our own tradition. Every year she changed her mind about what it would be. One year we did fondue but then she decided that was far too much work. Another year she made cornish hens but that didn't last either. I think I may have the same problem ... er, tradition. Always something new here, too. :)

Although we usually do make cut-out sugar cookies...
http://www.flickr.com/photos/impossibletask/5286907548/in/photostream/

[georgia]

oh, congrats on being expectant. i could write this post word for word, as i am a little over three months pregnant with our first. it is so neat to know that next time we celebrate christmas, we will have our baby with us. we've both gotten away from enjoying christmas like we did when we were kids, so we really look forward to having that revived with our child's presence.

i think decorating the tree will be our favorite tradition... or at least that was mine growing up.

[Amy]

We give our kids new Christmas pajamas on Christmas Eve (already washed so they can wear them for Santa's visit!). We usually give each other ornaments also, but this year we ran out of time and didn't get those.

[susan]

we sing carols around the piano...this year my mother added the antlers when we got to jingle bells. Naturally, i resisted to try to bring halt a potential horrible family tradition. But the next thing i knew..my mother had smashed them on top of my head! However, do to my lack of practice, or non-lack of wine..my trumpet playing was quite awful..(nobody complained that i stopped) and could take some photos..and post them on facebook muahahahah

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=488401101181&set=a.488397396181.271182.502186181
http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=488400476181&set=a.488397396181.271182.502186181
http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=488402246181&set=a.488397396181.271182.502186181

[Lauren]

Christmas eve seems to have turned into our family christmas, as we have family members whose jobs require them to work christmas day or christmas night.

One of my favorite things on christmas eve growing up was sitting next to the lit tree in a dark room, wondering what santa was going to bring.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/18572605@N02/5263615375/

[Thea]

We come to my in laws with sister in law family.I read night before xmas story to everyone, my sister in law gets each of the kids a new pair of jammies that they get as gift, we take pics of them and then they go to sleep and we fill stockings, put presents under the tree and then the grown ups open a couple stocking stuffers. Love the idea of a new movie the night before and have the kids watch it the next morning.