12 days of Christmas- Day One

I got this blog challenge from Chelsea Jewell and thought it was super cute! I've never done anything like this and thought it would be fun, so here goes nothing!

Here's the schedule:

Day 1: Christmas/Holiday traditions
Day 2: Black Friday/General Shopping Tips & Tricks
Day 3: Most meaningful gift/best gift you've received
Day 4: Tips/Tricks to a Budget Friendly holiday season
Day 5: Favorite Holiday Movie/TV Show Special
Day 6: Gift ideas (what do YOU want? We all have family/friends reading our blogs...so let them know!)
Day 7: Holiday Craft/DIY (If you don't make anything, what do you WISH you could make?)
Day 8: Least favorite thing about the Holidays
Day 9: Favorite Holiday recipe
Day 10: Favorite Christmas Songs/Caroles
Day 11: New Year Resolutions
Day 12: Show us your decorations (indoor/outdoor)
Day 13: Favorite Cookie Recipe
Day 14: Oprah's Favorite Things: What item(s) would you want if you were in the audience?

Day One: Christmas/Holiday Traditions

Well, this is a tough one for me to write about. Any other year I would be fine, but this year everything is changing (and I'm a little sad about it) so I'm writing about my childhood traditions.

For the past 22 years, my family has had our Christmas dinner at my grandparents' house on Christmas Eve. Then we watch "Christmas in Kennett", which is a TV special filmed in my small town and shows different holiday parties, plays, families, etc. Christmas in Kennett is a big deal to me. At 11:00 PM, we all go to the Christmas Eve service at church. This service is my absolute favorite. It's a candlelit, intimate service and I always see people that I have not seen in a long time. This is what I love and miss about living in a small town.

The grandkids then go and spend the night at my grandparents' house. That's right, I have spent the night at their house for the past 22 Christmas Eve's, and Santa has found me down there every year!

On Christmas morning, our parents come back to my grandparents and we all open gifts, then have Christmas Breakfast.

That's our Christmas (up until this year), and I LOVE it!

It's also become a tradition for all of the girls in my family to pile into my Mops' (grandma) suburban and ride around to look at Christmas lights on Christmas night. Fun fun! Another perk of living in a small town: you know where everyone lives and who puts up christmas lights!

Like I said, this year things will be completely different. Alex and I have become our own family and wanting to start our own traditions, while also wanting to continue some traditions from my family and some from his family. It's never an easy task to combine two families, especially when they don't live in the same town, but we are doing our best and quite frankly, I think we are doing a fabulous job!

Happy December, ya'll!

--- KPG