Family Holiday Traditions

Even if you like change and adventure, you probably still enjoy at least a couple of traditions at the holidays whether it be a turkey meal, or the ugly sweaters, or coming to a cabin at Campfire Bay Resort (we love that tradition!).  At our heart’s core, we all like to have things we can count on, that never change, and that’s what traditions do for us. Don’t have any good holiday traditions?  Or are you looking for new ones to start?  Take a peek at our family’s best holiday traditions and feel free to take one, or more, for your own!

Best Holiday Traditions We Invite You to Copy

Growing up, my mom was amazing at creating the best holiday traditions, and maintaining them. Besides breakfast in bed on our birthdays, hiding our Easter baskets that also contained a toy we really wanted (Christmas in spring!), and a special back to school shopping day every year, she created some great Christmas traditions.

When my boys were old enough, I wanted to continue these special traditions, but I soon realized that not all traditions can be passed down. Some of the best holiday traditions have to be left behind and kept alive only in our memory while new holiday traditions take their place.

A Holiday Tradition Left Behind

One of my favorite holiday traditions was “trim the tree” night.  We would be led blindfolded to the dinner table and sat down to a nice meal and an ornament thoughtfully picked out to represent something of our life the previous year.

After dinner, my mom would make homemade hot grape cider (see recipe below), homemade Chex mix, and a few different Christmas treats. She served them on cute, small festive trays that we would carefully take and place on the floor next to us  by our individual ornament boxes in front of the Christmas tree. We would then sip on our cider and nibble our treats as Mom would read from her Christmas ornament book and talk about each ornament given to each child yearly in chronological order.  When that ornament was mentioned, we’d dig it out of our box and go put it on the Christmas tree. We’d talk about the memories associated with those ornaments as we snacked and enjoyed the time together.  

I really wanted to continue this holiday tradition, but three active boys, and an equally antsy husband, did not mix well with a couple of hours reminiscing over ornaments around a Christmas tree. If you have a less active family that would enjoy the nostalgia of decorating a tree together in this fashion, I encourage you to try it, it might become your best holiday tradition. I still miss it.

Hot Grape Cider

Ingredients:

1 large can of frozen grape juice from concentrate

1 small can or half a large can of frozen orange juice from concentrate

5 large cans of water 

½ c. sugar

3 cinnamon sticks

1 tsp. whole cloves

1 T. lemon juice

Dump all ingredients except the lemon juice into a large pot and bring to a simmer.  Add the lemon juice after it’s been simmering for a wee bit. Ladle into mugs and enjoy!

May refrigerate and reheat again later or it’s actually good cold, too.  

A Holiday Tradition Kept

We have a few Christmas traditions that our family has actually continued.  With my side of the family, we always attend the candle lit Christmas Eve service at 4pm at our community church, and afterward we go to a family member’s house (this rotates every year) for a meal of the host’s choosing.  

After the meal, we all don silly Christmas hats and gather in the living room where my mom, the faithful journal writer, reads out loud the last year’s highlights of the entire family from her Christmas diary.  The Christmas story is read to the young great grandkids, and then people start dispersing the gifts to everyone until all the gifts under the tree are now on our laps.  Then, starting from the youngest, we each open one gift in order of age and watch so the givers can enjoy watching the gift opening. We repeat the loop until all gifts are open. 

Before retiring for the night, we each take turns stuffing everyone’s stockings laid out in a bedroom with small gifts and candy.  The next morning, on Christmas Day, we gather again at the host house and have brunch of monkey bread and egg bake while we open our stockings all together in beautiful chaos. Based on how much my now adult children like these traditions (minus the journal reading), they are likely to continue even after I’m gone.  Maybe one of these holiday activities could become the best holiday tradition for your family!

A New Holiday Tradition

When my oldest son, Elijah, was 3, we attended the local ECFE (Early Childhood Family Education) and were introduced to Lori Horton who shared her family’s recipe (see below) and best holiday tradition of making homemade gingerbread houses every year that they then smashed on New Year’s Eve.  I loved the idea and tried it out. Twenty-one years later, we’re still doing it. It’s probably our best holiday tradition.

The gingerbread is easy to make and it’s always so fun to see what the kids will create. We usually do it right after Thanksgiving Day and invite friends and family to join us to make their own gingerbread creations as well, We take pictures of the creations and then display them on the dining hutch for the month.

Then, on New Year’s Eve, right before midnight, we each put our gingerbread house on the table, grab an “implement of destruction”, as we like to call whatever large spoon, spatula, or stick we choose to smash our creation. Next, we take turns giving our goals for the new year on video before destroying the gingerbread. It’s out with the old and in with the new! If you’re family swings creative then this tradition might be a hit (no pun intended)!

Best Gingerbread Recipe Ever

Decide on your gingerbread design and cut out shapes out of cereal box or the like to be your templates.  For years our kids liked coming up with new designs–Train! Castle! Skateboard!  Death Star!–but in recent years, they just like the small house design we’ve had for years and it’s become their tradition to just decorate it in different themes now. 

Gather the ingredients and tools below in the recipe. Preheat oven to 350. BTW, I have always used a KitchenAid mixer for this dense dough. Ours is 29 years old and still going strong after so, so many baking experiments. They are worth the money. You can get one via this paid link HERE).  As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases. If you want an upper body workout, you can do the total mix by hand, but you’ve been warned.  

In a large mixer or large mixing bowl with hand mixer cream:

1 cup shortening

1 cup honey

1 cup sugar

In a medium bowl mix these dry ingredients with your hand, spoon, or whisk:

6 ½ cups flour

2 tsp baking soda

2 tsp ginger

1 tsp salt

1 tsp cinnamon

While the mixer is going at low speed, alternate adding a little bit from a ½ cup of water and a cup of the dry ingredients to the shortening mixture until the ½ cup of water and all the dry ingredients are incorporated. It will be much stiffer than chocolate chip cookie dough.  

On a table or counter, wipe the surface with a clean wet washcloth or sponge and put a strip of aluminum foil the same size as your baking sheet down on the wet surface.  This makes it stick!  Then put a nice glump of dough, about 2 cups worth on the foil and roll out ⅛-¼ inch thick. Cut out your shapes trying to put them close enough to get as many on a pan as possible.  We put straight edges right next to others. 

Cut out excess dough using a plastic knife or dull butter knife with a light hand so as not to cut your foil and add it back to mix until the next pan.  Lift the tin foil and put it right on the baking sheet and bake for 10 minutes. Work on the next round while it bakes.  One pan at a time in the oven works best and it’s usually done by the time your next pan is ready.  You can move the tin foil off the pans to help them cool faster and free up pans. 

If you have touching dough, use your plastic or dull knife to recut lines before they cool. Let the pieces completely cool and dry out a bit before starting construction.  You can make the pieces days in advance if you want.  

Make bases for your gingerbread creations.  You can use trays, boxes, whatever, but we use recycled thick construction Styrofoam for previous resort building projects that we cover with foil and reuse every year. Set your bases out on a table with an assortment of candy and cereal and bags of “glue”. 

Royal Icing “Glue”

In a mixer (way easier!) or mixing bowl with a hand mixer, whip 6 egg whites or ¾ cup of egg whites from a carton at room temperature (important!) for 1 minute.  Mix in 7 cups or a 2# bag of powdered sugar and 1 tsp. of cream of tartar to the mix slowly and then beat on high until the icing holds a peak (basically, stop the mixer and lift the beater. If the icing pulls up and stays up in a tiny mountain, you’re good).  This takes a couple of minutes. Using a rubber spatula, scoop the icing into quart zip lock bags or more eco-friendly,  reusable frosting bags you can get HERE. If using zip lock bags, fill one per person and after sealing, but a small hole in a corner. 

Squeeze the icing on the edges of gingerbread pieces you want to stick together and also use it to stick on candies, draw designs, etc. The icing hardens quickly, but it’s good to have two people working on one project, especially with impatient littles, to hold supporting walls and roofs together until the icing glue hardens. You can decorate walls and roofs 1st on the table and then assemble or assemble and then decorate.  

Either way, fun memories are made and when they’re done, display them somewhere safe and enjoy them until New Year’s Eve (or whenever). Then smash them or dismantle them however you want and eat any of it that appeals to you, preferably with a good cup of hot cocoa or cold milk!

Maybe you could start this tradition with a stay at Campfire Bay Resort and keep the mess out of your own house ;) Check out our family’s funny smashing videos on the resort YouTube channel below!

Did any of our best holiday traditions past or present look like something you’d like to try to make memories with your family? We love helping people create traditions and make memories here at Campfire Bay Resort so we hope this post gets you thinking!  While we know not every tradition fits every person or family, trying to start a new holiday tradition (or vacation tradition!) is worth the effort, if only just for the memories made trying.

Click HERE to see some of the fun traditions we have in the summer here at Campfire Bay Resort!