Traditions

By: Emily King

I love traditions, but I’m a big advocate for dropping the ones that don’t serve you. With a large extended family, and three young children, and a school calendar packed full of special dress-up days, I’m in a season of life where holidays can be more stressful than they’re worth.

A few years ago, after an intense battle with several sets of shorted-circuited Christmas lights, I declared the tradition cancelled. Messing with the finicky lights in the freezing cold (or sweltering heat, because we are in Pennsylvania) and then undoing the whole process after New Year’s wasn’t fun for us, it was a burden. Even though I grew up with the tradition of watching my dad drag the lights out of the basement and grow increasingly frustrated as he spent a whole Saturday troubleshooting burnt-out bulbs and replacing fuses, it didn’t mean I had to carry on the custom. We get to choose which traditions to keep alive and the new ones we want to start. 

So now we decorate each window with a hand-made wreath (a process I actually enjoy) an LED candle, and spotlights that accentuate the front of our traditional-style brick home. We’ve been told by a few people that it reminds them of the McCallister’s house in Home Alone, one of the highest compliments I can imagine. Hearing this made my kids forget any disappointment they may have had about ditching the string lights.

That’s not to say that I make the holidays about what’s best for me only. For example, that Elf on the Shelf keeps showing up every year even though he makes messes and ends up in weird places around my house. How does he find new hiding spots day after day, year after year? That must be very stressful for him. . . but he keeps coming back because my kids love him.

While we keep some traditions alive—I still use my mom’s sugar cookie recipe and have a box of childhood ornaments—it’s also fun to create new ones. We have a very specific drive-thru holiday light show that we visit every year. Buddy, our elf, brings a set of fresh Christmas pajamas for everyone on the night he returns each year. We usually do pizza on Christmas Eve, although last year we had an impromptu get-together with friends which may become a new tradition. See, it’s okay to make changes!

If fun family traditions are starting to feel more like a checklist of tasks, I encourage you to keep the ones that truly bring you joy and cut the ones that feel more like obligations. Find ways to replace old worn-out traditions with fun new ones. It’s the simple quirky traditions that are unique to your family that become cherished memories.