Favorite Holiday Traditions: Figgy Pudding, Christmas Catnip, Picasso Gingerbread House...

Isn't this a glorious time of the year!

I will admit that I tend to enter the holiday season with somewhat of a Bah-Humbug! frown on my face (Christmas commercialism, ugh!)...but the closer we get to Christmas Day, the merrier I get! 

One thing that helped turn me into a jolly old soul were the wonderful favorite holiday traditions you shared when you commented in my giveaway post.  There were too many treasures there to allow them to just stay buried in the comment field...so I'm bringing them out into the light for all of you to enjoy!

This will be an easy post for me - you're the writers!

My contribution: a small collection of 1950's vintage Christmas cards, and one early 1900's Santa postcard.

Enjoy... 

Debi (My Happy Sewing Place):  "One of my favorite holiday traditions is decorating our mantelpiece for the holidays....it's always so festive!"

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Ivy Black: "My favourite Christmas family tradition is putting all the things the kids made that are still in one piece, on the tree. Oh, and listening to carols whilst making dinner."

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Straight Talking Mama!: "I love Christmas so we have a few things we like to do, but my favourite is putting up the decorations.  We have set music we listen to, first up is the Andrew Sisters Christmas Album, in my opinion THE best Christmas music. Then we move on to White Christmas soundtrack, Nat King Cole, Frank Sinatra, you name it. I also like putting up the tree as we buy ornaments that remind us of different trips. We used to visit Switzerland a lot & in Basel they have amazing Christmas decoration shops! We've also got a couple we got when in New York.

Wow I've rambled on, can you tell I love Christmas!"

Twinkles1985 (Old At Heart): "Our tradition is watching A Christmas Carol and going and picking our Christmas tree..."

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Mary Van Note: "I love staring at the Christmas tree. When we were kids my brother and I would play a game with the ornaments. Like 20 questions but it was about an ornament. My brother would always hide the ornament he picked so I wouldn't find it."

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Vintage Sue: "Favorite holiday tradition? Eating everything in sight of course!!! hahaha"

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Into Vintage: "When I was a child, we had the traditon of giving our cat a Christmas catnip gift every year. Starting year two, it was wrapped in a metal coffee can after he went into a frenzy the first year, clawing open packages under the tree until he found the right one. Good times."

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Rosy (Sewing Addicta):  We are Catholics, so the gifts are on December 6 in the morning, and are supposed to bring the Kings. So on the night of December 5, children leave cookies and milk in the living room, so that 'Reyes Magos' eat when you come to leave gifts."

Lady Betty (Betty's Vintage Musings): "As for holiday traditions, my father is from Norway and has lived in the US since he was 25. So per Norwegian tradition, we have always celebrated Christmas Eve with a big dinner and party. My parents' friends and neighbors come by and join us for cocktails, snacks, and dinner. My mother (who is from Ireland) will also cook a huge Christmas day dinner as well! Mom also makes an amazing figgy pudding! (Talk about holiday weight gain! Lol)"

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Tanya904 (Starry Eyed): "One of our holiday traditions is to watch reruns of The Christmas Story and open one gift each on Christmas eve."

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Gina at Vintage Junk in My Trunk: "One tradition I DON'T like is I invariably break a shiny brite (or two) as I hang my vintage ornaments from the tree. Doh! Guess that just means I need to find more the following year!"

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Mrs. Cleaver:  "When i was a kid i always loved going up to the mountains to find & cut down a Christmas tree.The pine tree smell always reminds me of Christmas with my grandma.

Now that i have kids i always love leaving the milk & cookies out for Santa & carrots for the reindeer :) My hubby & i try to do things to make it look like Santa has been nibbling the carrots & making sleigh tracks in the dew on the lawn etc:)"

Lexy Mademyday:  "Everybody tells me my Christmas tradition is pretty boring but I like it!! I simply eat the best foie gras (made by my mum) and drink a good champagne in front of the chimney...and to top it all we watch "Pearl Harbor" snuggled up against each other on the couch!!"

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Diamond Events by Tiffany (Ramblings of a Girlie Girl Housewife): "We have many holiday traditions but my most favorite is riding around looking at all the holiday lights. We have done this since .... well forever....and just always have so much fun."

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Nancy (Waiter Waiter Percolator): "Favorite holiday tradition: Gotta be watching "It's a Wonderful Life" while wrapping presents and drinking hot chocolate. (Before I had a 16 pound, Christmas tree-climbing cat, it was decorating the tree, but haven't had a tree for 8 years now. We go to Granny's and enjoy hers on Christmas Day!)"

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Moviemag46: "For the last 26 years Christmas at my house has been all on Christmas Eve. I love how the lights look after dark, and it leaves all day on Christmas to play with any new goodies."

Helga! (Helga von Trollop): "G and my Christmas tradition is to try and get out of town and away from it all!!!Yeehaaaaaah!  XXX "

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Vivi.Deluxxxe: "When I used to live with my parents.. on Christmas morning after opening presents, we would make hot chocolate & drink it out of santa mugs and eat Peruvian fruit cake bread. =) "

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Lili M.:  "This is the third year in line that I'm sick when I think I should be decorating for Christmas. Does that sound like a holiday tradition? I hope not! We over here have two days of Christmas, December 25th, the first and the 26th the second day of Christmas. Now the first day is the 'family dinner and gifts day' but the second is the stay in your pajama's as long as you wish and play with your presents day. I love that 2nd day of Christmas. There are more than plenty left overs so you don't have to do anything. Everybody should have at least 2 days of Christmas and ending with a third (Sunday) to rest!"

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Kristy L.: "My best Christmas memory is my sis and I in our pj's with messy hair ripping open our gifts with much delight. And then looking back on the couch seeing our parents in their pj's with messy hair drinking coffee, also getting much delight watching us. So fun, I wish I could go back just for a few minutes."

ZeldaFitz79 (My Pretty Baby Cried She Was A Bird):  "My favorite holiday 'tradition', I guess, is the fact that my mother, in spite of staying up super late to play Santa and make sure all the gifts are in place, has always, ALWAYS been the first one up on Christmas morning. Sometimes she would have to wake US up...her anticipation level for opening presents is like a hundred times higher than either my sister's or mine. :) " 

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Starz (Vintage Down Under): "Ooh love it.We always have the big cooked breakfast drowned in maple syrup and the kids have to wait until Dad has cooked it and everyone has finished before they can touch a present:) We did stop the 'Mother has been getting into the sherry' tradition though after a few 'Mother is drunk by lunchtime' events...." 

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Nancy (The Hem M A Blog): "I don't have my own Christmas traditions yet, both this year and last year I've gotten a live tree - last year it died...Oops, I'm hoping that's not the Christmas tradition.  I always remember the great huge boxes of goodies we would get from my Grandmother though. One was full of grapefruits and the other had tons of different types of cookies and fruitcake and little presents. Sometimes bakelite buckles remind me of the shapes of her shortbread cookies now."

Modern Suzie: "My favourite Christmas tradition? That's a hard one but I would probably have to pick our activities for Christmas Eve. We always go out for Chinese food on Christmas eve (aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents and all) then to my parents place to watch Christmas movies and drink "Moose Milk" (my grandpas recipe which contains egg nogg, ice cream and a lot of liquor).

That or opening stockings on Christmas morning. My parents always put in a mandarin orange (as a treat) and a dirty potatoe (to remind us that we weren't perfect all year)."

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Tamarah (Shabby Vintage Junk):  "There's just Mr SVJ & I here & our Christmas is a fairly relaxed affair....The only REAL tradition we have is that we absolutely POSITIVELY have to get our REAL Christmas tree on the 6th December....That's Mr SVJ's birthday & the START of Christmas for us....Mind you....We get the tree on the 6th but it's often NOT decorated for a couple of weeks....As a matter of fact....That is the ONE THING I have to do today....hahahahaha....!!"

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Luna (No Soap, No Glory):  "Me and the kids make a gingerbread house the first weekend in December. It's never the same - we draw a new one each year. And it usually ends up as a Picasso creation, haha. When Christmas is over, we smash it to pieces and eat it ;) "

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Ann (Madeline's Memories):  "Our family Christmas traditions are not very original: we always cut our own tree and bring the dogs along. We always have appetizers for dinner the night we trim the tree. We always go to midnight mass and then have hot chocolate and cookies before we go to bed. And we always stop opening presents halfway and have breakfast on Christmas morning. (Our boys are in their 20's and no little ones yet.) Merry Christmas!"

 Merry Christmas!

xx00xx
Susan