Christmas Traditions

 December 1 has come around all too quickly. It marks the start of a few of our family Christmas traditions. The kids were excited to be able to put their first decoration on their Christmas tree (this year with the occasional added lolly bonus). 

Getting the first decoration

A star and a lolly!

He was so excited each time he pulled out the decoration

We also started putting out advent nativity. Eliza started us off.

And we started our Christmas book countdown. I had packed away the books in their bags at the end of last year so it was fun to find out and be surprised about which book came out each night.  I like that it started with a book focusing on Jesus and the nativity.

The kids took turns opening the Christmas book and putting in the nativity pieces. Getting the decoration didn't really matter who pulled it out first but this year, the others blocked their ears and closed their eyes so they were also surprised by what the decoration was.

Daniel read us his book some of the nights.

We all decorated the tree together which is always fun and nice to look at the ornaments and have the memories come back for some of them about who made them or where they came from.

James read the Christmas book with the Santa Hoopla hat on for a bit of fun.

And with the wonders of technology, he read us our Christmas book on FaceTime while he was up in Hervey Bay for Nana J's birthday.

Keeping up the tradition with my mothers' group, we made our gingerbread houses together (well, those of us who could make it). It was such a lovely night sitting, chatting and catching up properly. It was so nice that Tamara could come as we hadn't seen her for most of the year, and also Siobhan who we haven't seen for ages either because of work. And it's always nice to chat with Anne too. I liked getting my creative juices out again for the house.

So even with a mixed up year, with a mixed up end of the year we were still able to carry out some of our regular traditions which I love to do together with family and friends.