How do you remember passed loved ones?

[chillydownwiththefiregang]

I lost my grandmother to Covid- and I'm planning on raising a toast to her this Christmas. I'm interested if anyone has any special ways they remember a loved one at Christmas? ♥️

My parents died in January 2013. I still miss them and grieve for them.

I find my memories of them intensify every year in the run up to Christmas. I find myself thinking of my Mom teaching me how to make stuffing, and my perfectionist Dad fussing and frowning over trussing up the turkey and getting it in the oven.

I really miss my childhood and young adult Christmases. I am tearing up writing this!

I was recovering from surgery and a post op infection last Christmas so I am determined to have a good Christmas with DH, son, and grandchildren.

I am sorry for everyone's losses. A toast to family and friends no longer with us sounds lovely.

I have a photo of my grandma on my dressing table, so I see her twice a day. 16 years but always in my mind and heart.

www.notonthehighstreet.com/littlebirddesigns/product/memorial-bauble?referredBy=search

I got one like this but its also very simple to make, which would also mean you could maybe add something else into it as a personal reminder- like a charm or something.

@Sparticle

I'm so sorry for everyone grieving this year. In tears reading this thread.

Loved the holly on the ashes, would have made me laugh too!

Op, I chat to my loved ones who have died sometimes when no one is around. Not conversations but just an odd thought or something I'd want to share with them. I say hi and I miss them when I dust their pictures too. It doesn't matter if you believe in life after death or not, it's comforting to do.

Some wonderful ideas here, I make me and Mother a rocket-fuel strong cocktail and toast our missing one. to all of you

Favourite flowers on their graves

After my DF died I bought a special bauble for the tree. I've done the same for every other person we've loved and lost since. The baubles are all bird themed, some fabric, some wooden. I always feel emotional decorating the tree.

This is a very lovely thread. We have a robin bauble, which for me is my dad's bauble now. ("Whenever robins appear lost loved ones are near" for anyone who isn't familiar with the saying). My dad loved the garden and knew a lot about birds. Also all the big 70s Christmas hits (Elton, Slade, Mudd etc) now make me pause and tell him I miss him.

We have special decorations for our tree. However just before my great aunt died she wrote us a Christmas story. Pretty sure she was highly medicated at the time because it’s bonkers. But it has characters named after all of my siblings and our children. It’s written in pen and full of spelling mistakes and crossing outs. It’s about a gingerbread house. So each year, on Xmas Eve we bake a gingerbread house, read the story out loud with my whole family then smash the house and eat it. It’s my favourite tradition.

My husband died about 12 years ago when our kids were 6 and 4. Every year I do a personalised Christmas card and on the back a photo of him and the kids wishing him a happy Christmas.

My aunty always used to make cherry pie on Christmas Eve. I still do, even though it’s not the same. So do several of my cousins, and we share photos of our attempts. I also have some lovely ornaments that commemorate absent friends, I enjoy hanging them on the tree every year in memory. It makes Christmas more bearable when I can look at that bauble and feel that she’s still part of it all.

My mum died of covid last Christmas Day.

I have PTSD and a lot of traumatic memories surrounding christmas but I have children and I know mum wouldn’t want it ruined. We have baubles for her on the tree and I’m lighting a candle each night.
I’ve bought a gift for her still - it feels unthinkable for her not to have one. It’s an ornament to go in the rose bush planter I have for her.
On the 18th I’m starting a new tradition - mum celebration day. It marks a year since she went to intensive care. I’ll watch her favourite films, I’m going to eat an advent calendar in one go (mum loved chocolate, after we died we found out she’d already opened and eaten her advent calendar!), drink port and celebrate the fact I was lucky to have a mum so wonderful that her death has left such a gap in our lives

I couldn't deal with having the photo baubles, so I got these made for my son and daughter, with their nicknames on.

We also pick 2 stars on Christmas eve for them as we put carrots out for the reindeer.

So sorry for everyone on this thread who is missing someone this Christmas

@StCharlotte

Before the meal we always raise a glass to "absent friends" (which includes family).

Sorry for all your losses

Yes us too.

People that have gone come up in conversation at Christmas I find, their memory is often built into traditions. It’s a nice way to remember them.

Every full moon I go outside and sit and look at it. I hold her rosary and I talk out loud to her.

Similar to wiv12, there are significant dates in the run up to Christmas so I try to remember them through my actions and by doing stuff they enjoyed, especially those things I wouldn’t normally do.

My DS thinks of his great-grandad and uncle as 'stars' in the sky, so last year I bought 2 glass star ornaments for the tree with their names inscribed on them

I'm struggling with this. My DH died September 2020 and last year DS and I did very little in the way of Christmas as we were still reeling from the shock of his illness and death. This year I really wasn't sure I could cope with the tree - for some reason, it felt particularly resonant - but DS came back from uni keen for us to have one, so I found somewhere that delivered and we put it up today. I managed to get all the decorations down from the loft (always DH's job) and I am gearing myself up to decorating it tomorrow. It hasn't been as difficult as I thought. I like the idea of a decoration to remember him - we'll have to try and find something special.

I make a donation to a cause close to the family member in a way to honour them and help other people in the same situation - for example, my Nan passed away with a specific type of cancer so I donate to their charity and my Grandad committed suicide a couple of years ago - so I donate every Christmas in his memory to help other men going through mental health problems x

I buy some meals for the homeless , normally either from the Salvation Army or local church, in her name.

Both my grandad and nana died on Christmas Day, 4 years apart.
We just take a moment at 4:20pm each year to think of them both.
Yes that's the spooky thing.
The both died at the same time and my nanas watch stopped at 4:20.

My ACs dad died 7 years ago. He was cremated so I have some of his ashes in a little urn type necklace (I secured the top with Gorilla Glue) and I wear it to family occasions. He recently came to my birthday meal with us.
We celebrate his life a lot. We had been split up a long time but he was my BFF, and I miss him as much as our/his children do. We toast him on birthdays, and on the anniversary of his passing, and at Christmas because we know he is watching us from whichever place he ended up at (he wasn't religious, so he's probably hovering around on a cloud somewhere).

We always talk about past Christmases and reminisce about funny stories from when my Nan and Grandad were alive. It's not something we do consciously, it it's happens.

You can actually name a star in the sky.

I make a Christmas cake. My mum died 25yrs ago but I still have her handwritten Christmas cake recipe. Seeing her beautiful unmistakable handwriting brings a few tears to my eyes which are incorpoyimto the cake each year. Obviously I don’t

Incorporated
I don’t tell anyone
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