Family Traditions

My thanksgiving this year was full of fun, family and traditions.....some old, and some new. My husbands parents and grandparents came to celebrate the holiday and stay with us for several days.

The women worked in the kitchen to make the traditional thanksgiving dinner, and my 2 year old daughter begged to help with everything! Complete with turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy, squash, corn casserole, rolls, salad and 3 kinds of cranberry sauce - the dinner barely left room for the 6 place settings of my grandmother's china. Not to mention the 4 pies and cookies that were standing by for dessert. Before any food was served, the plates each plate held 2 kernels of indian corn. Before the prayer, each person gave thanks for 2 things, placing their kernels into the small turkey basket as it was passed around the table. The turkey dinner, the china, taking turns giving thanks...these are traditions we follow every year. But this year we added a new tradition as well and read Lincoln's Thanksgiving address at the table, which was a very powerful call to give thanks.

Some families go Christmas shopping on the day after Thanksgiving, but we start preparing for Christmas in a different way. My husband enlists as many volunteers as he can to help string lights on the house, the garage and the trees out front. Then we rearrange the family room, put the Christmas tree up and string lights on it as well.

My father-in-law carried on the tradition of his mother, and her mother - by making homemade italian pizzelle cookies. He brought all the necessary ingredients, took over the kitchen and spent the whole night making pizzelles...somewhere around 225 cookies. The house smelled wonderful for days and he left several tins with us so we can share them with friends and neighbors in the upcoming season!

Sharing these family traditions is truly special, but the time I enjoyed the most during Thanksgiving day and the weekend were all of our unofficial, unscheduled, unplanned family 'traditions.' The things that we just automatically end up doing when family visits. My kidsgot spoiled with extra hugs and attention from their grandparents and great grandparents. My daughter enjoyed countless hours sitting on the lap on one grandparent or another, reading her favorite books. We snapped photos of moments we wanted to remember. We ate leftovers for days and made too much dessert. We bundled up for walks out in the cold. We got everyone dressed and together for a family photo....as you know, that process can be quite the undertaking. We went to church together. We took afternoon naps (some of us anyway). We played games after the kids were asleep. We drank coffee & tea as we caught up on family news. We talked, we laughed, we enjoyed being together.