Now that we’ve gotten through Thanksgiving it’s time for December and all that it brings, which means the start of the holiday baking season and decorating. As we move through the month I’ll several of our traditions and our favorite holiday recipes too.
I’ve been known to decorate every room in the house at Christmas. From wreaths on the outside door to Santa soap dispensers and snowman towels in the bathrooms. How much decorating we actually do changes a bit from year to year, but our Christmas cookie baking never changes (usually we make 7 or 8 different types).
Cookies, hot cocoa, Christmas music and tree trimming–It makes for a perfect Sunday afternoon. After we moved to Florida from New Jersey it was much warmer, so we turn the A/C down low to put us all in the mood. We usually have one large tree set up in front of the living room window and it is covered with different ornaments. Every year I would buy all the kids a new ornament for the tree. Eventually we outgrew the tree, so now the ornaments get rotated from year to year.
These last few years I had to adjust my decorating because we have a very mischievous cat in our midst. His name is Pumpkin and he likes to climb things and knock things over. So I’ve only been putting up this small tree. As you can see it’s too small for him to climb, and we’d put the presents on the floor underneath it. This year I’m determined to go back to our full sized tree. I miss it, somehow it just didn’t feel like Christmas without it.
After I have it up I’ll add the picture to one of the future blogs. But in the meantime, what is your tree trimming tradition? Do you do it before Thanksgiving or afterwards? Do you do anything special or just dive right in?
I’m sharing my recipe for one of the girl’s favorite cookies–Meltaways. They love making them as much as eating them. I think it’s because with the dough tinted red and green it’s more like playing with play dough, especially when they were little. I always have to make a double batch of these if they are home. If you try the recipe, let me know how you like them.
Oh one other thing, even though over the years I have started celebrating Christmas, I am Jewish and I celebrate Hanukkah. I didn’t celebrate my first Christmas until I got married, as the children grew up we continued to celebrate both holidays and we have traditions for both. I’ll be posting some pictures of my menorah as the nights continue and share some of those traditions as well.
Related articles
- Christmas Traditions, Old & New (fourtoadore.com)
- Christmas Traditions and Ideas (thehawkscreech.com)
- It’s time for Christmas Cookies (chefpavel.wordpress.com)
- 11 Holiday Traditions To Start With Your Family (lifewithoutpink.com)
Lynne St. James 
Other than Spicy Pumpkin Pie, we have no traditional recipe as we are Jewish as well. Once or twice during my marriage, off and on in the years since the divorce, I have put up what is lovingly known as a holiday tree in honor of my only Grandmother. She was raised Christian, never converted when she married my Grandfather but a rabbi officiated and they celebrated both religions holidays. Holiday season is a difficult one for me, and some years I cannot get up the desire to put up the tree [a sad reminder of losing one of the few who loved me unconditionally and never tried to change me]. Thinking about doing it this year. Thanks for sharing your story Lynne.
I can understand that, Cheryl, and thank you for sharing that with me. It is hard when we no longer have what we once did or what we expected to, and this time of year only serves to accentuate it. One of the ways I try to do it is baking cookies to bring to my neighbors and when my daughter was home she used to go play violin in the Nursing homes. It always brought more joy to the holidays. 🙂
I decorate my entire house, usually, but this year I’m not really in the mood. As for cookies – my mom does the meltaways and the kids LOVE them! Between the 2 of us, we make about 15 different kinds of cookies. I usually do the standard chocolate chip, peanut butter, oatmeal raisin, no bake, and peanut butter chocolate chip. My mom makes the sugar and other fancy schmancy ones….then we trade.
I love making so many different varieties! It’s so much fun. We used to make gingerbread, meltaways, sugar cookies, jam thumbprints, toffee crunch bars, chocolate Italian cookies, to name a few. Thanks for sharing, Kim!
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