Welcome back from the weekend! I hope it was a great one. We enjoyed a really wonderful Friday night with neighbors and then watched our son rock his TaeKwanDo tournament. It’s amazing how much your heart bursts when your child is putting themselves out there to be judged. I wanted to run out on to the mat and squeeze his cute cheeks. I restrained. But the weekend (and talking about our family albums) really has me feeling nostalgic. Our family started talking about all of our favorite traditions and it prompted me to share them with all of you. I firmly believe that a life rooted in tradition gives children a firm sense of who they are and a foundation for cherishing time with family. I am sharing five of our family traditions. They may not be earth shattering or quite that imaginative, but they are the bricks on which our home and family life are being built.
Back to School Rainbow Cake
Those of you who have read my blog for a while know that each year to mark the first day of school, we eat rainbow cake. The kids and I make the cake on the last day of summer and without fail, the excitement over doing so never seems to wane.
Part of the tradition is these two choosing which colors they will get to make. I let them work it out and some years are smoother than others. But the idea that it’s a giant cake seems to steer them in a peaceful direction. And to those that have asked, I don’t use a special recipe. We back straight from the box (two boxes to be exact) and make five or six round cakes. I just divide it evenly into bowls so we can add the color.
We love to celebrate them beginning a fresh school year, making new friends and being brave when it’s not always easy. This photo was a candid one taken when my husband was looking for candles to put in it. We had just finished dinner and the anticipation of cutting into the cake was all over their faces. This year, my daughter told me she can’t wait to make this cake with her children on the first day of school. Sigh.
Family Dinners
This one is big in our home. We eat dinner together each and every night. I know that we are lucky that our schedules permit that, but we also work like crazy to make sure that they do. I grew up eating dinner around the table as a family every night and saw such value in that. The kids already feel it and if one of us is out-of-town or if we are away as a family, there is always this sense of calm when we sit back down for our next family dinner together. This is when we talk about our days. We share the high and the low point and we just enjoy each other’s company. It’s a nice time for the kids to open up about things going on at school or socially. We always like for them to know that they can tell us anything and this often where that occurs. (You can check out my easy recipe ideas here).
Fourth of July Run
Each year our neighborhood hosts a huge Fourth of July celebration and we always participate in the morning run. It’s so much fun to get out there as a family doing something healthy and seeing such a strong sense of community. Each year my daughter is a little up in the air about participating and inevitably she is so happy with herself when she finishes the run. Another little life lesson tucked in there and we always cap the morning with a pancake breakfast. We are hoping to run the longer races as they get older (although someone may have to carry me across the finish line. A runner I am not).
Summer Getaway with Friends
For the last five summers we have traveled to Big Bear Lake with two other families. It doesn’t matter how much time we have spent with these families during the year, the trip is always magical and so great for everyone. The children have all grown up together and they look forward to this trip every year. This is the trip we always document with a photo album each year. I think that children thrive knowing they have a community of adults around them that they can trust. They also look forward to this time of year and spending time with friends they have known forever. And we don’t spend a lot of money. We never even really leave the cabin except for time on the water and the dock. It’s good fresh air fun and we savor every second of it.
Striped Pajamas
Listen. I know my days are numbered with this one. And you are probably thinking why the heck is this a tradition? Well, each year the kiddos get Christmas PJ’s and they are always striped. There is just something about children in striped pajamas that makes my heart happy. And while this one may be more for me, the kids really do love them and it just wouldn’t be the holidays without these two running around in stripes. I wonder how they will feel about it when they are 14 and 16. Hmmm. I choose to live in the now and not worry about that yet! Stripes forever.
What are your family traditions? What is the glue that connects your years? I would love to hear what you all look forward to. And I think that is such a major component about relishing family traditions. It gives us all something to look forward to. And it gives us that sense of comfort that despite the craziness of life, the hurt, the disappointment, the ups, the downs. . .that consistency and stability exist. There are certain things we can count on. And don’t we all like to know we can count on something. There is great peace and comfort in that.
This past year we’ve been really big into implementing family traditions (such as Friday Night pizza). We didn’t have a lot of traditions when I was growing up (aside from opening one present on Christmas Eve) so it’s all new to me, trying to discover traditions that fit our little family perfectly. Some things work (who doesn’t like pizza once a week??) – others not so much (apparently pre-teens do NOT get excited about helping in the kitchen), but it’s been a fun learning experience. With a year of “trials” under our belts, and our family finally complete (as our last child is 1.5 now), I think 2016 will be the year that we really push for LASTING traditions that can help to bring our family closer together.
Stockings have been a tradition in our family for as long as I can remember! I look forward to Skyping on Christmas morning with your family while you open the stocking stuffer gifts I’ve chosen all year long – it makes me feel connected to you the entire year! Living across the country is difficult on holidays, but this tradition makes me feel like I am there!
Grandma Sue.
As a new family (with two littles), we already have some family traditions and we are slowly forming new ones. I am a sucker for family traditions as we never had any growing up… A few of our current favourites:
Spur dinner (every child’s birthday and on the first night of school)
Family dinners
Sunday lunches
Birthday mornings (cake, candles, balloons and presents in the persons/childs bed)
Decorating the Christmas tree
Easter pjs (we buy the girls their first Winter pyjamas in their Easter baskets)
Christmas photo shoot (for our Christmas card and annual pictures)
x
P.S. We are in South Africa so our seasons are opposite and our school year starts in January!
I love these family traditions! Can’t wait for matching holiday PJs this holiday season!! 🙂
I LOVE this post! Takes me back to my childhood and all the fun traditions we had – popcorn & movie night on Fridays, Family dinners every night, beach vacation every year and looking for shark’s teeth, dying Easter eggs with friends each year, buying an Easter outfit with Grandma, opening ONE present on Christmas Eve, and taking a picture as we entered the room to see our gifts on Christmas morning. I’m looking forward to having traditions with my future family! Such fun things to look forward to 🙂 and how lucky your kids are to have a mom who intentionally plans for traditions like these!
Thanks for sharing your family traditions. My kids are still pretty young but I look forward to creating more traditions like the ones you have …as they get older. The one tradition we have already started though is getting Christmas pajamas….for the whole family. St Nick brings them for all of us ….and we look forward to wearing them on Christmas Eve …and getting lots of pictures. :-> Thanks again for sharing!
My Christmas pyjama tradition is fluffy pyjamas on Christmas eve with a new book and each year the kids get excited about it. Even my eldest who is 18 although I’m no sure how often he wears the pyjamas after Christmas eve! But even when he gets a permanent girlfriend she will be added to the fluffy pyjama tradition as I hope it will make whoever he is with feel part of the family xx
Love these! Our kiddos are really young right now (2 yrs and a newborn) but my husband and I are really looking forward to creating our own family traditions.
I love these traditions, especially family dinners! We also make them a priority and they keep us connected.
I love these! One of our major family traditions with our two girls (12 and 9) is that on the last day of school, they get ice cream sundaes for breakfast. Sprinkles, chocolate syrup, the whole shebang. They look forward to it every year and I document it with a cute picture! The last day of school pretty much is a free day with not a whole lot of instruction, so who cares if they don’t have protein? They’ll live! And I hope they’ll continue this with their kids! 🙂 It’s easy, cheap, a memorable way to say adios to school and early mornings!
I loved reading about these! I cherish family traditions so much and it is nice to see what your family does together. Gives me some good ideas to add to our growing ones!
What fun family traditions!!
Her Heartland Soul
http://herheartlandsoul.com
Courtney, I love all your traditions! I actually adopted the rainbow cake from you! We love making homemade Korean dumplings for the new year which is an annual tradition. We also take a yearly summer vacation with close friends, do the pumpkin farm in October, make Operation Christmas Child boxes in December, etc. These family traditions are so special to me and I hope my kids will continue them when they’re all grown up. Btw, love your blog! I’m a long time follower 🙂
Don’t tell my girls it is uncool to receive and wear matching PJ’s on Christmas Eve…LOL We still carry on that tradition and they are almost 22 and 26!!! They also receive 12 little gifts leading up to Christmas (the 12 days of Christmas box) and decorate gingerbread houses on Christmas Eve.
We used to have hot oil fondue each New Year’s Eve, but now that they are older and have plans of their own that evening, we have moved it to Christmas Eve as they love it and want to continue.
Eating together as a family was ALWAYS a big deal, even as they got older and were participating in sports.
And, as with the Christmas traditions, the one year I didn’t do Easter baskets because “I” thought the girls were over it, I had two VERY disappointed girls. Who knew?!!!
I love this post, Courtney!! I have kiddos the same age as yours and they are really starting to understand and look forward to our traditions. We always make apple crisp when we come home from apple picking in the fall. We also make apple pie together every Thanksgiving. They always look forward to it and as it gets closer, ask about it! It makes my smile. We have also started going on evening walks together after dinner, every chance we get. Our little troop of four walks around our neighborhood and chats about the day. I love it! I love your traditions! The striped pj’s are so sweet!!
Courtney I think your family traditions are wonderful!! And your smiley kiddos who are clearly benefiting from all the love you give them! I adore traditions too. My kids are 17, 15 and 13 now and they still open PJs every Christmas Eve. They don’t match anymore but I always take a photo of them. One year I couldn’t find the right size for my eldest and then completely forgot about them, so I had to wrap a pair of PJs he already owned, it was pretty funny when he opened them and the kids still laugh about how I recycled the present! 🙂 What a joy it is for your kids to be growing up in your house with all the intention you put into motherhood, they are truly blessed.
Courtney, where do you usually buy your kid’s striped Christmas PJ’s?
I love the posts that tell personal stories. I feel like we get to know you and your family better. My kids are 16 and 13 and we try to do the family dinners as much as our schedules allow. Try to keep that one as long as you can. We do the matching PJs and we open them on Christmas Eve. We have down graded to just a shirt or just the pants b/c they are so expensive and my family usually won’t wear them after Christmas. So there is still hope that your family will keep that tradition. You just might need to tweak it a little!!!
Jenn
I love family traditions! Thank you for sharing yours!
My favorite as a kid growing up was having chili every Halloween. My mom would make it homemade, and it was really the only time we got to have chili. It was an easy to eat dinner because as kids we were so anxious to get out for trick or treat, that we’d hardly eat anything. Then when we got home, and were inevitably hungry, the chili was still warm in the crock pot for round two. My husband’s family growing up always made homemade pizza on the night that the Wizard of Oz was broadcast on TV 🙂
For our traditions… We do a “picnic” in the living room for Super Bowl. I make appetizers, and we eat on the living room floor in front of the TV. We don’t let our kids have TV for family dinners (which we have almost every night), so this is a fun family treat. We decorate our Christmas tree the Friday or Saturday after Thanksgiving each year. We also do a Christmas wrapping paper picture each year. I have the kids pose with the mess of wrapping paper each year. It’s fun to look back on!
I love this so much Courtney… We always made little traditions like this while Emma was growing up and it’s the one thing Emma always brings up. Sunday morning pancakes with Dad and movie night with the family, etc. Too many to count… 😉 Families need these traditions in order to bond and grow more with one another. There is so much going on in this great big world but it’s the foundation that supports everyone and keeps us strong.
xoxo
This is just SO inspiring!!!Thank you for this beautiful post.Your rainbow cake tradition inspired us actually,last year and last September we had a pancake meal on the day before school,as my son just started school last year.
And your posts with the ‘back to school banner’ led me to crrate something suite similarité.
I need to think more… Thanks again!!!
Sorry my iPhone sometimes turns back to French on its own.Please amend the last sentence,I meant ‘something quite similar’