We thought that instead of a Christmas blog post with a Currier and Ives Christmas card picture…We’d share a bit of ourselves and our fondest Christmas memories and traditions with all of you…
We’ll be gone the next couple days…but, will be back getting ready for Bridget and Kevin’s New Year’s Eve wedding
Hope you enjoy this!
1. What’s your favorite Christmas tradition?
Mark: Decorating our Christmas tree – we collect Christmas ornaments from all of our vacations, some family pieces and of all our pets (past and present) …we spend the night reminiscing about Christmases past…
Rebecca: One of my favorite traditions is something we do on Thanksgiving to kick off the holiday season. We watch a series of movies (White Christmas, The Walton’s Homecoming, Little House on the Prairie’s Christmas at Plum Creek) and we bake cookies.
Karen: Present day it would be going to Longwood Gardens on Christmas Eve- it’s a tradition my husband and I started before kids, and we continue today with them.
Christina: Going to NYC every year since I was a child to see the tree and skaters in Rockefeller center
Kristin: We go to mass and then to pop-pop’s to hang out with family and open presents from the aunts and uncles at midnight
2. What’s your favorite Christmas food?
Mark: I’m a foodie so I have several – when I lived in Washington DC I had several close friends over Christmas Day and made a Roast Goose with black bread, sausage and apple stuffing.
Baking chocolate chip cookies…
Rebecca: Sweet Potatoes with marshmallows on top, firm believer that all food should have toasted marshmallows on top…
Karen: My husband’s pumpkin roll and chocolate roll are amazing!
Christina: Christmas cookies – the only time I allow myself to indulge
Kristin: Seven Fishes!
3. What’s your favorite Christmas Carol?
Mark: Oh Holy Night! – Preferably the Josh Groban version
Rebecca: Carol of the Bells or the Halleluiah Chorus, both of them give me chills every time I hear them.
Karen: It’s so hard for me to pick one favorite! I guess The First Noel… but really any of the traditional hymns that speak of Jesus’ birth.
Christina: Feliz Navidad – my Mom and I would sing it at the top of our lungs in the car
Kristin: Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas
4. What’s your favorite Christmas cartoon?
Mark: The Little Drummer Boy – it reminds me of Christmas with my mom
Rebecca: Rudolf, he’s just so cute.
Karen: Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer- The runner up would be The Polar Express which started watching with our kids over the past couple of years as our Christmas Eve movie.
Christina: The Year Without a Santa Claus – now my daughter’s favorite too.
Kristin: Frosty the Snow man!
5. What’s your favorite Christmas movie?
Mark: Christmas Shoes
Rebecca: White Christmas, I watch it every year…what I would give to dance like Vera Ellen…
Karen: Love Actually (a non-traditional Christmas movie)… Elf is a close second!
Christina: It’s a Wonderful Life – I cry every year
Kristin: Miracle on 34th Street
6. What’s your favorite Christmas memory?
Mark: Putting the Christmas tree up in its stand and getting it ready for Santa to decorate after we went to bed Christmas Eve– I think we did this until I was well into my teens…my parents enjoyed the time together
Rebecca: When my parents chewed up bits of carrot and sprinkled them around the house for us to find on Christmas morning. I was thoroughly convinced that all 9 of Santa’s reindeer had made their way into our home to eat all of our carrots.
Karen: I can remember clearly one year we left carrots for Rudolph and the reindeer the night before Christmas and on Christmas morning saw the bitten stubs of them outside our house in the snow. THAT to me was proof of SANTA!
Christina: Every year my Mom would donate a gift to a needy child in my name and my brother, Anthony’s name. She would write the gift we gave and the age of the child on a note and put it in the toe of our stocking. We couldn’t wait to get to the toe to see what we gave.
Kristin: Decorating the tree Christmas Eve before we go to mass
7. What was your favorite Christmas gift?
Mark: I have tiny handmade Christmas ornament – a mail box with my name on it– my mom had made it before she passes away…we found it in the closet with several other presents
Rebecca: My engagement ring…it came a few days after but it makes this time of year extra special for me.
Karen: Although it was a few days after Christmas, I’d have to say my engagement ring!
Christina: Every year seeing my son and daughter’s faces when they come downstairs to see what Santa brought them
Kristin: Barbie Dream House!
8. Real tree or artificial tree?
Mark: Love the smell of a real tree, but we do three trees and like enjoying them all month long so we do artificial…
Rebecca: Artificial, if we got a real tree Dan would probably never stop sneezing (haha). Also, this way when the cats knock it over we don’t need to clean up all the branches, needles and water.
Karen: Real!
Christina: Real, of course!
Kristin: REAL!
9. Do you exchange gifts on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day?
Mark: Both – after Christmas Eve with my brother’s family, open house at my aunt and uncles and Candlelight Service at church we’d come home and exchange ONE gift each… then the rest on Christmas morning.
Rebecca: Christmas Day and also during Hanukkah. My fiancé is Jewish so we celebrate both each year.
Karen: Christmas day- usually before the sun even rises!
Christina: Christmas Day
Kristin: Christmas Eve –
Merry Christmas from our family to yours….we wish you all a holiday season filled with Hearts, Health and Happiness!