Happy Christmas and a Merry Holidays! I am super excited about this year. It is the first year we are celebrating the holidays as a family unit. Our daughter, who is now 6 months old, is just loving all of the bright, colorful lights and sparkly décor. She is at such a fun age to be able to really experience some of that Christmas magic. We are so excited to create memories with her and finally establish our family Christmas tradition.
As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.
This year is a little bit off because of everything going on in the world, but we aren’t letting that affect our joy in the holidays. Since our regular Christmas traditions with our parents and siblings has changed, we are focused on creating family traditions unique to our family unit; mostly with gifting.
Annual Gift
Our tradition is starting with her very first Christmas, Ruby is getting a stack of books as one of her gifts every year. Early literacy exposure is so important. I have never been a big reader myself, but as a teacher I have come to realize the importance of reading and how it can affect a child’s academic abilities in school. I want Ruby to be ready for school and to develop a love of reading too. When I do read for fun, I love it; creating the scenes and characters in my mind and letting my imagination take over is a true escape from reality. I can’t wait to see that in Ruby and for her to explore her own imagination. So I will be buying all of the books, please! I’ve already created a list of my next purchases for her that you can see and buy from on my Amazon Shop. 🙂
Gifts From Us
For another part of our Christmas tradition, we are planning on giving her a gift(s) from each parent. These will be special to our individual relationship with her. For example, something to do with a hobby or interest we share. My husband would LOVE if she got into his airsoft hobby. Fingers crossed she likes it, because I’m not a huge fan LOL. I’m into crafting and decorating, so if she ends up liking that too, I would gift her craft supplies or projects we can do together. It all depends on what she likes at the time and we are willing to explore new interests with her as well. Since she is so young this year, we aren’t thinking to hard on it. We will get her some developmentally appropriate toys that she can grab and chew. I mean that IS what she’s into right now anyway.
Santa
I talked to Santa already and he said he would take care of her stocking and a BIG present; something she has been really good all year for (or half a year in this case). We don’t have a lot of extra money and know we won’t be able to buy the big ticket items on her future lists. So Santa volunteered to be part of our tradition and have his elves make her one special, more expensive gift from her list every Christmas. That way she knows she has to be good to earn it and will accept the frugal lifestyle of her parents ;P Hopefully, Santa will fill her stocking with a mix of useful things, fun trinkets, and of course, CANDY!
The Gift of Family
The last gift will be a family experience. I have always tried to gift activities to my loved ones rather than physical items because #1: I never know what to buy and #2: I know what they really want is to spend time with me. Now I am taking it a step further for my daughter. I want to experience as much of life with her as I can and for as long as she’ll let me! Plus, it is the motivation we need to explore new places and try new things. This year, we are planning a visit to the aquarium because she loves to watch the fish in our tank at home.
A fun part about this Christmas tradition is how she will be able to “open” it. We are going to box and wrap CLUES! I am so in love with this idea I am doing it this year even though she will have no idea what is going on. HAHAHA! For the aquarium I am including some fish tank décor we aren’t using, baby water toys, and ocean wrapping paper. I am sure I will get even more extravagant each year because I’m that extra. As she grows older, we will make a vacation out of it and go somewhere or do something we all enjoy. We don’t have much to spend so we are making the dollars count and the memories last a lifetime.
I hope you take this Christmas time and make it meaningful for you and your family; maybe start some new traditions of your own. It has been rough year for all of us and it deserves a happy and positive ending. Feel free to share your holiday family holiday traditions in the comments. I’d love to hear them! 🙂
Related Posts
- The Ultimate Christmas Movie List
- From House to Home (Décor from the Heart)
- So This Is Motherhood
- Bonding Over Baby Girl Clothes
- 5 Easy Ways to Bond with Your Baby Daily
- My Pinterest Boards for Family Life
