***Edit-I am loving your comments! I’d love to hear non-holiday tradition ideas, too. I struggle with traditions for our family outside of the holidays and could use some ideas.

The mention of our family going out for breakfast on the first day of school got me thinking about traditions.

I think my parents were much better at traditions than I am. The traditions that I think about most often center around holidays.

Some were great: (Left over birthday cake for breakfast and celebrating July 4th by making peach ice cream in our ancient, mint green ice cream maker that you had to cover with rock salt and crank endlessly.Laying in our station wagon in our PJ’s while my parents took us on drives at night. Sleeping out under the stars with my mom. Singing “O, My Father” to every newborn in the family as their first song.).

Some were not: (Ok, I know that I started the Thanksgiving tradition of the five kernels of corn thing to count off our blessings when I was in fourth grade, but seriously? Our family is just too.freaking.big. It makes me want to put a fork in my eye by the 10th person. Stop. Please?)

Like millions of other holiday saps around the world, my favorite memories and traditions involve Christmas.

Growing up, we all got to sleep in the same bedroom on Christmas Eve. We would whisper excitedly and listen to the news reports about sightings of Santa’s sleigh all night long in tortured anticipation. We were horrible about pestering my parents during the night and we usually started asking if we could open presents starting at about 2 am. We were relentless until they finally got up.

In the morning, it was FORBIDDEN to go down the stairs. Now that I am a parent, and given how much freaking time it took for them to just “Turn the Christmas tree lights on!”, I suspect that they did most of their wrapping, sorting and placing on Christmas morning. It was just to torture us with agony, I know it.

My father went to great lengths to show evidence of Santa’s visit. We had an old, wood burning fireplace and every year we would put a sheet out in front of it so that the carpet didn’t get dirty. In the morning there would be soot bootprints on it. One year there were reindeer tracks, a turnip with a bite out of it, and an old-fashioned sleigh bell that fell off Santa’s sleigh on our driveway.

My parents were pretty good at the whole tradition thing and I have incorporated many of these into my own family.

Just like when I was growing up, Santa doesn’t wrap up his presents for my boys, he leaves them unwrapped in designated piles. (I have to confess that Santa is kind of a cheap bastard at our house. Hey, there is no way I want a red-suited fat guy taking all the kudos from my children. I admit it. I’m petty. Suck it up and deal, Fatty.).

Some of the traditions of my childhood I avoid.

Iron-clad rule? You are not allowed to wake up the parents on Christmas Morning before seven am. NO EXCEPTIONS. It’s just better for everyone that way. My kids don’t crash by 1 pm and I am not a Ho-Ho-HAG all day. Eggnog is OUTLAWED. I will also never serve Hawaiian Punch mixed with Sprite at any holiday dinner held at my abode.

Some traditions I blend in with Jonathan’s childhood traditions. We always saved our stockings for last when I was growing up, but he really wanted to use his family’s tradition of getting stockings first and eating out of them when you watched other people open presents.

Some traditions are all our very own. We started using Christmas gift bags instead of our decorative stocking (So they don’t get grody). Jon’s stocking is another tradition. He always gets the same food treats: A wheel of Baby Swiss Cache Valley Cheese, a box of Triscuts, Beef Jerky, Sunflower seeds, Dr. Pepper, Ande’s Mints, and a Hickory Farms Beef Log. (Dude. I will never understand his adoration for that food product. I mean, it isn’t bad but you would think that it is made out of platinum for Pete’s sake.).

We always watch “A Muppet Christmas Carol” on Christmas Eve with the boys, and once they are in bed Jon and I put on Christmas tunes, light candles, and spend a couple of hours wrapping, assembling and making the living room look homey and perfect. They are two of my favorite hours of the year.

What is most heartwarming to me is that even if there was bickering, fighting or downright screaming when I was growing up, there were loving moments in all these traditions. I love sharing them and creating new ones with my own little family. I cling to the memories they create.

I want start new traditions with my family, too. Every day ones. So, talk to me. What are your favorite traditions???