My Family Christmas Traditions

This post is not about France, but about my family's Christmas traditions. This year, going home for the holidays was not a trip squeezed in at the last minute between Christmas concerts and Christmas parties, but one planned for and enjoyed as a time to be with my family. Coming from France and watching the unfolding traditions in my new city, I was also much more aware of the things we do as a family, in our small New England town, that are meaningful in different ways for each of us. I will include a reflection on some of the French traditions in another posting, but below are my memories and take on what my family does to celebrate the Christmas season. (Warning: long posting!)

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Christmas Eve Memories

My grandparent’s home on the corner of Cornell and Weaver Streets in Scarsdale, NY is the site of my first Christmas memories. Their home was a mansion to me at that age, with its long driveway leading up to the three story structure, with its columned porch that faced the massive front lawn. The house itself was made for entertaining, with a large living room and dining room making up most of the first floor. A wide staircase bisected the two rooms, and was the first thing you saw when you came in the front door. But we always came in the back, through the kitchen, where we could find my grandmother fussing over the preparations for the meal and making sure that we all had something to drink. My grandparents had a maid in those days, Lucille, a black woman who prepared their meals (my grandfather’s gift to my grandmother). I can’t remember if Lucille was there on Christmas eve, but she was a lovely woman, and she always treated us grandkids with kindness.

The entire family gathered at my grandfather’s house for Christmas eve. It was an “event” – my grandfather was magnanimous (and could afford to be) in this way with the family, and everyone (brothers, sisters, cousins) took advantage of the invitation to come for the evening. There was always a table full of food in the dining room, and copious amounts of alcohol were consumed, I suppose, though I only remember drinking ginger ale at that age. The evening was marked not by the eating of food, but by the arrival of Santa Claus. Usually my great uncle Richard, who had no children, dressed up in the Santa suit, but it was some years before I figured that one out. When the tradition started, we kids (there were six grandchildren) were babes in arms, but as we became more aware of the figure of Santa, the appearance of a “live” Santa was pretty awesome. The entire family would assemble, standing and sitting, in the living room, and we would hear a tinkling of bells from above, and “Santa” would come thundering down the stairs (ostensibly from the roof) shaking bells and bellowing “ho, ho, ho” as he burst into the room. There was a time when he was quite scary to me, but there was also another reason to be anxious about his arrival. When Santa came into the room and was escorted to the large wing-backed chair set up for him in the front of the room, he (or my grandfather, more likely) would say something to the effect that before we kids could get our presents, we had to perform for Santa. I’m guessing that this was the brainchild of my grandfather, as he was an accomplished tenor soloist, and I imagine he very much enjoyed the prospect of his grandchildren following in his footsteps.

My parents, also singers and musicians, had made sure that my siblings and I were all involved in playing musical instruments of one kind or another. But ever the shy one as a child, I always remembered this particular evening as yet another opportunity to be embarrassed in front of a crowd. We each would tentatively get up to play on the baby grand piano or on our instruments, or even sing (my cousins were not consistent in their musical training, although my aunt was a very accomplished pianist). Sometimes even some of the older cousins would contribute to the evening’s performances. Afterwards we kids would be handed presents (from our grandmother, via Santa), and then Santa would take his leave, disappearing up the stairs as my great aunt would start playing Christmas carols for all to sing.

Santa Resurfaces

The Christmas eve tradition ended with the death of my grandparents in 1981 (actually, it was held in their home in 1982), but the Santa tradition was a strong memory for all of us in my family. My mother made sure to retrieve the Santa suit from my grandparent’s house to use again – which it was, after the births of my sister’s children. My sister’s family has almost always come up north to my parent’s home for Christmas, and for several years my mother found a friend, or sometimes one of us siblings, to dress up in the suit for Chelsea and Nathan, as we recreated the appearance of Santa coming down the stairs, and asking for performances from the children, after which gifts would be presented and Santa would disappear. The fear in my niece and nephew’s faces was amusing to watch, but I remembered quite well the same apprehension when the red-suited man appeared when I was their age. It didn’t matter that there were many other people in the room, there was just something about a character you only knew about from books appearing on Christmas Eve, in your own home, that was pretty awesome and awful at the same time.

After we stopped going to my grandparents in the 80’s, my family established some its own traditions, which have ebbed and flowed over time, but essentially have stayed the same as the next generation of the clan has grown (and now are nearly grown up!).

Today's Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve continues to be an important time for our family, and the Christmas Eve service at First Congregational Church has been the focal point since we moved to our town in 1974. We are a church-going family, and despite the fact that we have mixed feelings about the First Church service, which is always a children’s re-enactment of the story of Christ’s birth, along with the singing of Christmas hymns and the lighting of candles, we have continued to attend year after year. For many years, it was a time to reconnect with friends, after we had gone on to college, but it is no longer a reliable place to see old friends. After we were too old to participate in the play or light candles, we would sing with the choir, but more recently, my sister’s children (and Chris and me) have provided the prelude music for the service (ensembles of violins, cellos, recorders, and/or piano). The service begins early in the evening, 6 p.m. this year, so we traditionally have a quick dinner beforehand. Mom has made lasagna or manicotti many, many, many years in a row, so people have come to expect this filling and warm dish on what is typically a cold evening in December!

Forever, it seems, my mother has also enlisted our family to help her put on a fellowship hour after the service, so that families can see each other and mingle after the service. And frankly, the congregation does take advantage of the time and victuals offered; the kids are a bit pumped up after their performance, and it’s a good time for them to start the unwinding process. Punch and cookies are the menu for the reception, and the focus of the table is always the Gingerbread House.

The Gingerbread House

The Gingerbread House is a pre-Christmas activity led by my father for I’m not sure how many years now. The Gingerbread House recipe came from a cookbook given to us by my aunt when she was President of the Junior League of Washington (DC), and it is a recipe that I have used several times over the years myself, after wanting to have the same fun my dad always seemed to be having as he made the house. Dad tries to design and build (yes, it also involves design these days!) the house before we kids have made it home to Amherst, but sometimes we get to watch the building process, as he cooks sugar over the stove and then tries to swiftly put together the pieces of the house without burning himself on the hot sugar! After the house is stable, the fun of decorating the house begins. Non-pareils, M&Ms, licorice, red hots, NESCO wafers and other random small candies are among the candies that provide color and character to the house, attached using a egg-white/confectioner’s sugar icing. Decorating is a family affair, although my sister Chris has an artist’s touch when she is there to lead the effort. In past years, I would build a house for the Winter Solstice parties I held in Virginia, and let the kids in attendance decorate the house as they wished – it was often a happy mix of colored icing and random candy application. My dad’s house does not suffer from such randomness given the artists in the house, and there is an effort to make the edible decoration truly a work of art, which allows for its eventual ending. Shortly after Christmas the house is given to a family or individual chosen by my parents, for whom the gift may brighten their holidays in a meaningful way.

Christmas Eve Reflections

Post-Christmas Eve service is a quiet time for my family. Given the flurry of activity before the service (last minute arrivals of family members, last minute cookie baking and house decorating, last minute musical rehearsals for the service, the swirl of eating before heading to the early church service and finally dressing in time to get out the door and down to the church - only a 7 minute walk away! – in time for the service itself, and then managing the after church fellowship hour and cleaning up afterward), by the time we are back home, (almost) everyone is exhausted from the effort. We tend to gather in the living room of my parent’s house, a room not used often during the rest of the year, as that is where the Christmas Tree stands, in the sun of the southern window bay.

The activities that take place around the tree have varied over the years, but regardless of what we have done, I have always relished the time to just sit back and relax for a short period of time on Christmas Eve, before the frenzy begins again the next morning. My mother has made an effort over the years to make it a time of sharing and reflection on both Christ’s birth and our own lives. When we were young, we would light the final candle in the Advent wreath that, inevitably, one of us children had made. Sometimes my father would read us “’Twas the Night Before Christmas” or some other relevant story that he had chosen. As we got older, we were asked to contribute to an Advent “service” with readings from the Bible or from a three-volume Christmas traditions set that was brought out of the bookshelves for that purpose each year. When a Swedish exchange student gave us a traditional Christmas candle set (four candles set around a base with a fan of flat sticks overhead that, once the candles were lit, would begin to swirl, setting off the circular base with its Christmas characters), we incorporated the lighting of those candles into our evening as well. Once we had become young adults, my mother introduced another way for us to share: we were each asked to write down on a slip of paper our expectations for the year ahead. The slips of paper were stowed away in the infamous “gold box” until the next year, when we would read aloud our previous year’s predictions (often to laughter, sometimes with sorrow) before writing up our thoughts about the upcoming year.

A Sweet Tradition

Christmas eve was also a time for opening some special gifts. For many years, until her death, my mother’s aunt Marge would send us a two pound box of chocolates from a local candy shop in her hometown of Sykesville, Maryland. The box of Dolores Truly chocolates was a Christmas tradition for as long as I can remember. That box of chocolates would last far after the holidays, as my mother was sure to hide the box not long after Christmas Day, only bringing it out for special moments in the following weeks. My brother in law purchased the box of Dolores Truly the year after Marge’s death, so we would have it to remember her by, but I have continued the chocolate box tradition by sending to the house a two pound box from Godiva Chocolates – not quite the same, but still good!

Incorporating the tradition of some other families, we began several years ago to open one gift each on Christmas Eve. With the young children, this was a little difficult to manage, and I must admit, at my age, I’d rather wait until Christmas Day, and leave Christmas Eve as a spiritual time, rather than a time to focus on material things. But for a very special gift that you cannot wait to give, or get, the quietness of Christmas Eve is a special time to enjoy that pleasure with your gift-giver/receiver.

Post-reflection and chocolate eating on Christmas Eve, everyone goes off to bed. Everyone, that is, except my mom and dad. Dad typically has not wrapped a single package, and begins his arduous task that evening. My mom is the creator of the effect of Christmas morning – it is she who has hung stockings, and bought things to put in them for each member of the family. She continues her family tradition by placing an orange and a penny in each stocking toe. The new penny is for good luck; the orange is a reminder that there is something to eat for everyone (she is a child of the Depression). She distributes presents (all those she had in some back closet somewhere) under the tree, and sets the table for breakfast with festive napkins and candles. She no longer has to worry about making breakfast in the morning, but she likes to make sure that the table we sit at the next day will be eye-catching.

The Christmas Pancake

Decades ago, we received a Christmas flyer from our old church, First Congregational Church of Old Greenwich, in which there was a recipe for a “Christmas Pancake.” My mother insisted we have it on Christmas morning, and it has been a tradition ever since. We were already a pancake and waffle crowd, so it was an easy sell. The pancake has a bit of drama, as it is cooked (with flour, eggs, milk and butter) in a large cast iron pan in the oven. Once it has cooked for 20 minutes, one takes the pan out of the oven and drizzles lemon juice over the top, before returning it to the oven to brown. By the time the pancake (and a large one it is) is taken from the oven and sprinkled with confectioner’s sugar, everyone is ready to eat! When we were a family of five, it fed everyone easily. This year, with 8 of us, the portions were a little smaller, but no one complained. I made the pancake for many years (I was always the first one up, and I like to bake), but in the past several years my niece and nephew have taken over the cooking responsibilities. The breakfast almost always includes a fruit salad (my mother’s tradition – a fruit salad for breakfast is a staple for all special breakfasts) and sausage, for those who need a little something more substantial. When I was introduced to Starbucks Coffee in the early 90’s by my Seattle friends, I began a tradition of sending Starbucks coffee so we could have it for our Christmas breakfast. (My Dad had been an instant coffee drinker for most of my growing up years.) It’s not always Starbucks anymore, but the breakfast almost always is a good coffee day for those coffee drinkers around the table.

Bringing Gifts

Once the pancake has been consumed (which doesn’t take very long), typically the youngest at the table is dispatched to the next room to bring stocking gifts to the table. Long ago we found that the stocking gifts got lost in the shuffle of the major gift openings, and that extending our time at the breakfast table was a nice way to begin the process of opening gifts, while still extending the anticipation of the gift opening that would take place around the tree a short while later. One person at a time opens their gifts (you would think there were a limited number of gifts to be given – NOT the case!). When there are no more gifts in the stockings, the group decamps the few steps to the next room, each to find a comfortable place in the living room where they will spend the next hour or so unwrapping gifts and giving kisses and hugs to the gift-givers, eating chocolates and oranges and other assorted things that are unwrapped during the morning’s chaos.

We always say, fewer gifts next year. Last year, the adults took a different tack at my sister’s suggestion, and many of us gave gifts to the non-profit organization of the givee’s choosing. But that didn’t seem to stop the overflow of packages under the Christmas tree. Even this year, my niece exclaimed, “I thought we were in a recession!” as she gazed at the tumble of packages under the tree. But my mother loves to find little things and wrap them up, and we all seem to find that one thing that we wanted, given to us by someone else. A nice tradition.