Tell me about your family traditions!

[Angliski]

Hello!

we have a young family. I had a very dysfunctional childhood, parents didn’t seem to like being parents. I’m keen to create a family that enjoys one another :)

I would love to hear about your quirky family traditions- what are they, how dot hey bring you all together and how did they come about? Did this generation make them or have they been in your family for yonks?

thanks in advance for the inspo!

We pick pumpkins every year and decorate them for Halloween- when DD was a toddler I would just let her scribble on them with marker and stick google eyes on them, now she marks out a design that DH dutifully cuts out for her!

Saturday night is pizza and popcorn night every week without fail. We watch a film and each person in the family takes their turn to choose the film on a weekly rotation. The others aren't allowed to argue with the choice. Often it means I'm on my phone if DD2 chooses Frozen AGAIN but I do love that time of the week.

On Friday night DH and I always put some music on, make a G-T, light candles in the living room and just sit and have a chat about our week and our plans for the weekend.

There must be a chocolate caterpillar cake for every birthday.

DDs are still little so before bed I get them to think of something nice to dream about and tap the side of their head to lodge the nice dream in there 🤣. It's something my dad always did for me if I'd had a bad dream in the night.

Loads and loads of traditions around Christmas. A new special bauble every year that has some sort of meaning, picnic under the Christmas tree with only the fairy lights on for lighting, a Christmas light safari.... driving round our town one December evening spotting Christmas lights with Christmas music playing and hot chocolates in the car. We've done that one since DDs were tiny.....even when toddlers they'd have a warm chocolate milk in a sippy cup during Christmas light safaris ☕

Some of these came from my childhood and some developed with my own kids, but we love all of them...
• school photos first day each school year, all taken in the same place
• birthday child gets to pick a special "birthday" cereal for the shopping list (because I'm a mean mammy who won't buy chocolate cereal every week)
• everyone lines up at the top of the stairs on Christmas morning in age order before going down to see if Santa came
• everyone at the Christmas Dinner table makes a speech about the year just past (saying thanks, remembering good times, remembering challenges that we've overcome...) everyone from youngest child to oldest grandparent gets to say something

My brother and I always build and decorate the gingerbread house pretty late (too late really) in the evening the day before Christmas Eve (we come from a country where Christmas Eve is the big celebration day). Our mother always "tells us off" for leaving it so late, but then she gets involved too, and we have so much fun. And then our father takes a lot of photos of the finished ginger bread house.
Also, in January, before we break and eat the house, we have to take pictures with my brother and I next to house. We are adults now, but this is still a tradition.

This is probably not very unique, but we always light our respective christening candles when it is our respective christening day.

We have a lot of picnics, no matter what time of the year, in different places. It doesn't have to be a lot of food, sometimes just coffee and cockies, and the destination doesn't have to be far away or a big landmark, it can be a pretty place in the area. The important thing is to sit outdoors, on a blanket or a bench, and just enjoy the nature and the scenery, and the company.

The kids all smash up their Easter eggs and they all get put into one giant Tupperware in the fridge, the smashing is their favourite part of Easter!
any one celebrating a birthday get the birthday bunting, there is always a homemade cake and a gathering of whichever family are around to join in the celebrations.
We always have a cooked breakfast when we come home from any holiday, no matter what time of day or night.
Friday night is steak night, we all hang out in the kitchen while me and the dc play games and dh cooks and joins in a bit, music and no telly.
we eat a proper home cooked dinner together every night (exceptions being if people are out which is fine and happens frequently! The rest of us will eat together, even maybe a takeaway but no one takes dinner to their rooms to eat etc) and just talk. This one is so important for me, I grew up without much stability or routine, no family meals - I ate on my own and I have sad feelings about it!
The dc decorate the Christmas tree, I’ve never done it myself. We choose it at the farm together, dh cuts the base off and trims the branches, I do the lights and they put on the decs.
Lots really but I suppose they seem to evolve over years.

You have to go out for dinner the night before holiday and eat pasta on the night you return from holiday

All children including the 20 year old must have a Cadbury multi pack of chocolate for Xmas. The stash must always include pyjamas, a book you have no interest in reading and some silly socks

all birthday cakes must be Colin, alternative caterpillars are not acceptable!

You must have a new toothbrush for holiday: dc1 blue dc2 pink dc3 yellow. This must never vary

the only present grandma and grandpa are allowed to buy DC1 is the new season football shirt from his team every year. Started at 6, now 20 and there must also be a new fifa game. We started with fifa 2007 and now 2023

My DC are still little so I hope there are more to come, but off the top of my head-

We have a bright pink sectioned picnic plate that we call the ‘choosing plate’. About once a fortnight I fill each section and then can take whatever they like for their tea. They go nuts for it 😂

‘Car toast’ on the first day of the school year- this evolved by accident when I was so OTT about every single detail of my eldest’s first day in Reception that I actually overlooked the fact she needed breakfast before we left, so I gave her a slice of toast in the car and now that’s breakfast for any important first day

Giant number balloon on each birthday

Strawberry picking to start off the school holidays

On birthdays, the other two children get one present each to unwrap

(realise a lot of ours are food related!)

LOVE the pp about the dad leaving a candle on ❤️

Every birthday from the age of one I write my kids a long card - telling them how much I love them and also describing what they are like at that age, a few of their achievements or features. We keep them in special boxes that we decorated with them and I hope they'll enjoy reading them when they grow up.

We have a cooked family dinner every night, kids have always been part of it (not precious about bedtime). Everyone has to share the best thing that has happened to them on that day. (The elder DD sometimes rolls her eyes st that but they all play along).

Every school holiday at least one day walking around central London, having an ice-cream from an Italian gelato shop and choosing a book at Waterstones.

Strawberry picnics on the trampoline.

Songs at bedtime and then I "give DD a dream" - make up a little story for her to dream at night. It can be an adventure or something she wants or something silly and absurdist.

apart from Christmas ones we have a few in our family
We always get tubs of chocolates for children in need, it’s a big family thing, we always sit down to watch it together.. similar with Eurovision

birthday boy or girl chooses what we eat… thier birthday thier choice.
we watch Harry Potter twice a year… June & the week before Christmas

on pride weekend in our town we always have Chinese day of and then bbq the day after.

We have what we used to call a 'toddler mezze' for dinner once a week which is basically shorthand for cut up vegetables, pitta bread and dips because I can't be arsed to cook. Child is not a toddler any more but we still do this each week and call it a toddler mezze.

On car journeys everyone looks out for number plates with their initials in and tots up their points. Bonus point if it's an electric car.

Each week at the weekend we do a big tidy up. Everyone who gets properly stuck in and is helpful (adults included) gets some sweets and their choice of drink from the corner shop after and we eat them watching a film.

They're not very exciting traditions but I enjoy them 😆

I do this too 😆 always to the tune of Eine Kleine Nachtmusik at bath time. 'Feet, his feet, it's time to wash his feet, knees, his knees, it's time to wash his knees' etc etc.

Opening Christmas stockings all in bed together on Christmas morning is the best 😊

Fire in the garden & roast marshmallows, or the beach if you’re near one.

You’re doing brilliantly @Angliski
It’s the milk float/ yellow car stories that bond a family- the christmas and birthday traditions will come, particular films, stories about when someone dropped the turkey etc.
Mine are all 20s now but we had a lovely bonding drive with them recently all squished in the back remembering holidays and the school run.

We both, (me and DH) read to our daughter every night. Unless she falls asleep quickly or one of us is busy. It means she always has at least two books on the go. And we get to choose different books. He likes funny ones. I go for strong female characters & magic.

Oh and made up bedtime stories. I have series of stories, some of which have been going for months. We'll get bored of a particular theme and then come back to it a few weeks later for a new instalment. Our current favourite is one about a cold giraffe who has to find an animal with hands in the savannah, like a monkey (because hands are necessary for knitting clothes.) He always realises another body part is cold right at the end of the story to set up the 'plot' for the next night. They're not brilliant stories but I will look back on them fondly, even if DS looks back and thinks I'm a total lunatic in hindsight.