Winter/Holiday traditions?

[Kitsuragi]

It's almost that time in the north! Leaves are all fallen, grass is getting duller, days getting shorter in the Northern Hemisphere... Winter's on it's way!

Winter is my least favorite weather, but the holidays are the best. I celebrate both Hanukkah and Christmas since my family is half Jewish & Half Catholic. Now that I live with an agnostic parent, I just kinda celebrate both as a fun thing rather than religion. It gives me an excuse to make tasty meals, give fun presents, wear silly sweaters and stay the heck inside. Nothing beats a fireplace, hot soup, soft blankets and cozy games for me. It's the best feeling.

What do you do for the holidays, and if you don't celebrate any of the holidays, what do you like to do in the winter when it gets colder?

 

[Xara]

winter is my least favourite season as well. i adore the holidays and the cold temperatures, but i’m not a huge fan of the snow, slush, ice etc. my mobility and balance aren’t the greatest so even with boots on, i’m always slipping and sliding around. it’ll be worse this year since i’ve a fractured foot and am in a walking boot, so i don’t imagine i’ll be getting out much.

but i do love the holidays, and am so so excited for christmas. literally as soon as halloween is over, my brain is like !!christmas!!! haha. my family doesn’t celebrate it much anymore (or at least not as much as we did when i was younger), but my mom and i still have a sort of holiday ‘tradition’. my mom and i love going on drives together, and every december we’ll go driving a couple times just to see all the christmas decorations that people have put up around the city, in their yards, near businesses and shopping areas etc. i love christmas decorations so much, and seeing people go all out with them makes me happy!

my family and i have a couple other ‘traditions’, like playing games together (usually monopoly), and watching new year’s eve countdowns on tv — and, now that i’m old enough, drinking while watching them haha.

we also had a tradition when i was a kid that on christmas eve, i could open one present that was under the tree. any present i wanted. the rest i’d have to wait until morning for. this tradition died when we stopped decorating and didn’t really have the money for presents anymore, but i still get at least a stocking of goodies every year. but i always enjoyed seeing what was in my stocking more than what was underneath the tree anyways, so i’m not complaining.

 

[Beanz]

my family has a tradition where we open presents from each other on christmas eve night and then we open the presents from “santa” on christmas day. apparently it’s a norwegian tradition my dad got from his family. we also order or go out for dinner.

 

[Croconaw]

Winter is my least favorite season, lol. I don’t feel the need to celebrate something that gives me anxiety. I dislike the cold and hate the snow even more. I was born up north where there are six months of winter and not the usual three to four. It sucked big time.

The only thing I’m looking forward to this year is the winter event TBT is holding. Other than that, a huge middle finger to this season. I like to stay close to warmer climates when winter approaches, at least until I can relocate to a warmer location permanently.

 

[bestfriendsally]

i love christmas!! all the pretty lights, all the presents under the tree ^^

i hate the cold, though.....

 

[nightglow]

We (my spouse and I) celebrate Christmas but it isn't done in a strict way or anything.

We put a tiny manger scene up in the house after Thanksgiving (USA Nov 24th) and usually stays up until February. I'll also start listening to Christmas music I like after Thanksgiving. We watch a couple of Christmas or winter movies in December. Hot chocolate is whipped out for the evenings frequently.
We also go to a church service the night before Christmas. We visit some family on Christmas and more family another day that works for everyone. We eat. We tend to buy gifts for just the kids in the family usually. To us, it makes more sense.

That's pretty much it for us. Some of this spills over into winter in general though.

 

[Mr_Persona]

We dont have any special traditions sadly. Open presents on Christmas day and decorate for Christmas right after Halloween and thats it. We go to my grandparents every Christmas. I wish we did more things for traditional.

 

[LadyDestani]

I wish I had nice traditions to make things a little more pleasant during the winter. I hate the season in general and now that I consider the holidays more stressful than fun, it gives me nothing to look forward to until spring.

I can't even think about Christmas until I'm done with what I call 'birthday season'. I have 13 family members that I consider close relatives and nine of them have birthdays from October through December. My birthday is also in November. So with all that going on plus Thanksgiving, I've learned that Christmas is no longer something I plan or prepare for until the last birthday is done in mid-December. I don't even put up decorations anymore because I simply don't have the time and energy. I can barely keep up with buying, wrapping, and shipping gifts during the last 3 months of the year.

Growing up, my family had traditions for Christmas and New Years but those disappeared as everyone got older. Now we don't do much to celebrate. My family gets together to exchange gifts on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day. We visit my husband's parents to exchange gifts with them on whatever day we don't see my family. My husband's sister does have 5 kids and the most important thing for me is getting them memorable gifts since they live out of state and I don't get to see them very often. We never know what we're doing with them for Christmas, though. Some years they travel to see us, some years we travel to see them, and some years we just have to ship their gifts to them. It's always up in the air until the last minute because they don't like to plan anything.

The nicest thing about the holiday for me is just finding a quiet time with my husband to do a private gift exchange.

 

[Aniko]

I love winter, I spend all summer looking at Winter photos blogs, but my favorite season is still Fall.

Our Christmas is rather quiet, we celebrate more on Christmas eve than the actual day. Generally on Christmas day, we just don't do anything and eat leftovers in front of the tv. When I was a kid, we spent all night skating and sliding until sunrise. Well kids were doing that (unsupervised) while adults were dancing and drinking. Then on Christmas day, kids were all crying because they had little sleep and adults all had bad hangovers, so everybody was in a super bad mood around the turkey. Ah memories...

 

[Bluelady]

On Christmas Eve, we would visit a religious relative’s house. We did what is called a “posada”. Basically, it’s caroling about Joseph and Mary’s journey to get shelter, then Jesus’ birth, and yada yada. At midnight we would sing “Las Mañanitas” (Spanish version of Happy Birthday) to a statue of baby Jesus, and then hit a piñata. I remember having fun as a child, but that joy slowly disappeared as I became more aware of the gossiping that follows family reunions.

Supposedly the ones in Latin America are better because they treat it as a festival and sometimes do nightly caroling.

The tradition that I enjoy the most is the festival held around December 12th in honor of the Virgin Mary. This link will explain it better than I ever could. LINK
I like this festival because of the story behind it. Also, the church that I used to attend in LA would hold a massive carnival. I’m talking rides, game booths, and so much yummy Mexican food.

Now, we just go all out with the Christmas decorations. There’s not much to do where I live.

 

[Envy]

Late autumn and winter are my top favorite times of the year. The times that really bring me to life and make me happy. Needless to say, I do enjoy decorating and celebrating them.

I go all out for Christmas... Or as I celebrate it, Winter Solstice. I put up tons of trees every year. Several in my room alone. I enjoy theming them, like one is a tree of woodwind and brass instruments. Yup, for real. I have an ornament for all of them. Another is a white tree I decorate with peppermint decorations, and another is pink which I put colorful decor on. I love it so much, I have so much fun!

I do exchange gifts as well. I love giving gifts. I haven't had a stable job for years until this year, so I'm really looking forward to being able to gift family and friends this year. It's been too long!

 

[tbro13]

It's almost that time in the north! Leaves are all fallen, grass is getting duller, days getting shorter in the Northern Hemisphere... Winter's on it's way!

Winter is my least favorite weather, but the holidays are the best. I celebrate both Hanukkah and Christmas since my family is half Jewish & Half Catholic. Now that I live with an agnostic parent, I just kinda celebrate both as a fun thing rather than religion. It gives me an excuse to make tasty meals, give fun presents, wear silly sweaters and stay the heck inside. Nothing beats a fireplace, hot soup, soft blankets and cozy games for me. It's the best feeling.

What do you do for the holidays, and if you don't celebrate any of the holidays, what do you like to do in the winter when it gets colder?

I love decorating for Christmas! winter is my favorite because I love being comfy and warm and winter weather validates my giant blanket pile. It snowed where I live this morning!

 

[Ravenkitty22]

I love winter, and the whole Christmas celebration (minus the family gatherings part.) We honestly do more celebrating throughout the month of December than on Christmas day. Christmas decorations go up the day after Thanksgiving (4th Thursday of November since I’m in the US), and it usually takes us a few days to get everything. We usually get some kind of advent calendar too. From there, I sing an excessive amount of Christmas carols, we bake cookies, go to various parties, and exchange gifts on the 25th. My little brother’s birthday is also in December so the whole month is chaotic.

There’s one tradition in particular that I didn’t know wasn’t very common until recently. On the night of December 5th, everyone puts a pair of their shoes either by the front window or underneath the christmas tree, and the next morning there’s usually an ornament, some chocolate, and something unique to each person inside each pair. We do this to celebrate St. Nicholas day, which goes back to our family’s Polish roots. I remember as a little kid sharing the things I got to my friends at school and wondering why no-one else had anything.

I’ve always loved winter as a season. When you love the cold but live somewhere it doesn’t get cold often you tend to look forward to the winter months. (Snow is really pretty too, as long as it doesn’t shut off the power like it did a few years ago) Though, my birthday is in winter and apparently I was born during a crazy snowstorm, so I might have a little bit of bias xD.

 

[oak]

Me and my partner have a pretty laid back winter. We will have a Christmas dinner with my moms side of the family on Christmas day. We always put up a tree in our house & decorate. Our decor is a lot of handy-me downs so it's not the fanciest but it works. Last year I got a real tree the first couple days of December so the day after Christmas I had to throw it away cause it was so dry. Maybe this year I'll get a fake tree even though they're not as fun as a real tree.