Holiday contest!
December 13, 2006
Okay, forgive my loserness in not mailing packages, all y’all that I owe prizes to. I have the yarn–it’s getting to the post office that’s killing me. It will come! Don’t send out the Without a Trace team yet. On second thought, send Agents Taylor and Fitzgerald, and I’ll pretend to be lost. Sigh.
I digress. Let’s have another contest!!!! A two parter. Tell me your (1) favorite or craziest holiday tradition and (2) your favorite holiday memory , and I’ll pick 2 winners to send some yarn to! Because what is a Christmas (or Hanukkah or any holiday for that matter) without yarn? Let’s go until December 18th, and I’ll get it in the mail–maybe even in time for Christmas? There are still miracles you know. And if you win and you are not a knitter, I’ll find something else as a prize. Candy? Something treat-ish.
And a huge THANK YOU to the sponsor of this contest–Laura. She donated yarn for contests. She’s an awesome SP9 gal. We love you Laura!!!!!!! And let’s pause to be totally jealous of her new car which is the exact car I want.
Edited to add: You don’t have to be in sp9 to play.
redhead ramblings 
December 13, 2006 at 10:12 am
I’m thinking 🙂
December 13, 2006 at 10:27 am
Is this for everyone or just SP9 folks?
December 13, 2006 at 11:31 am
Hmmm… favorite/craziet holiday tradition? I think my favorite would be our Christmas Eve tradition: Nick and I make sugar cookies sometime before that evening. When we’re ready to settle down for the evening, we gather up our tubs of (cake) frosting, sugar sprinkles, and et cetera and have a cookie decoration evening while we watch “How the Grinch Stole Christmas”. In the past, we’ve marked “bedtime” as right after this viewing. The “best” cookies are selected for Santa’s Plate, the reindeer chow is tossed out onto the front yard, and Nick retires. Randy and I then settle down to watch “It’s a Wonderful Life” (black-and-white) or “Miracle on 34th St” (1959 version, black-and-white).
Actually, I think I like Christmas Eve more than Christmas Day!
My favorite holiday memory? Hmmm….. They all blend together! The funniest is the year a long-distance friend and I bought each other fountain/dipping pens for Christmas without knowing the other one had done so. *grin* Sadly, she’s lost all of it due to Katrina’s wrath and New Orlean’s failed levies.
I’ll keep thinking on “favorite memory”.
Anne.
December 13, 2006 at 1:06 pm
My favorite Christmas tradition is when we take turns reading the story of the birth of Christ, I really like it when my kids argue over whos turn it is to read, they all want to. And of course there is the cookie baking, making more cookies than anyone ought to have in a lifetime.
My favorite Christmas, has to be the first Christmas after my dad retired from the Army. It was the first time we had a real house, not family military housing and we had a huge yard and we got sleds and bikes and all the stuff we never had room for in the military housing. It was great.
December 13, 2006 at 1:26 pm
1. My craziest holiday tradition is always waiting until the 24th to buy, put up, and decorate the tree. Then it is a struggle to leave it up until New Years- I am ready to get rid of it on the 26th!
2. My favorite holiday memory is the year I was able to get my girls exactly what they wanted for christmas.
December 13, 2006 at 2:11 pm
Favorite tradition is my daughter and I baking all our favorite cookies and they get eaten so fast we have to keep baking more.
And Monica choose my favorite Christmas memory:
but what’s funny about it is the first year after dad retired we got bikes and it snowed like crazy and the next year he got us sleds and it was sunny and warm. But we did get to have things we never had room for or had to haul all over the country.
December 13, 2006 at 3:14 pm
1. My favorite tradition is putting up the tree, which we always do the day after Thanksgiving. We have hot apple cider, and peanut butter cookies with mini reese’s peanut butter cups pushed inside. We always look forward to hearing the “B.C. Clark” jingle the first time of the season. (local jewelry store with the same jingle for 50 years…)
2. My favorite memory is a tough one, but last year’s Christmas was pretty special. My family “adopted” my sister’s friend who has a rough home life and got to love on her and give her a real Christmas, with love and care (and good food and presents too)!
December 13, 2006 at 4:39 pm
I think my favorite Christmas tradition was my mom putting oranges and nuts in our stockings. To this day, I think oranges are pretty special.
And my favorite memory was when I put pomegranates in my sons’ stockings instead of oranges. It pleased them just as much as the oranges pleased me so many years before. There’s something about the duality of it being the same but different that I enjoy.
December 13, 2006 at 5:55 pm
Hmmm…
Favorite and (possibly) craziest Tradition: we are in tradition changing mode here, but *My* favorite is listening to Bobby Vinton’s Peppermint Stick Parade while decorating the tree (whenever that turns out to be). My mom always knew I was in the Christmas Spirit – Peppermint Stick Parade would start blaring from the stereo… sometimes, that was AUGUST (though not the decorating part. Just the song part. I played it so much, I wore out the record album (some of you are old enough to know about vinyl records, right!? ;)) and Mom replaced it with a CD of the album a couple of years ago.)
Favorite Holiday Memory: Surprising Mom on Christmas morning. We were only able to do this a few times that I remember. Mom was the doer of Christmas and the ultimate wrapper and festooner of ribbons. One Christmas, Dad got her a HUGE Aquamarine ring (her birthstone) — he did the little box, in a bigger box, in a bigger box (six boxes total) like the Russian Nesting Cups. And she cried and cried. (after really getting annoyed at about box 4!) Each box was carefully wrapped, just like Mom would wrap it, so it took her a long time to get through the ribbons and bows! That’s probably me favorite. We were able to pull off just a couple more surprises, but that was the best one.
December 14, 2006 at 7:01 am
[…] Lorinda is having two contests – leave comments about your favorite holiday tradition and your favorite holiday memory by December 18. Knitterly prizes for knitters, non-knitterly prizes for non-knitters. […]
December 14, 2006 at 8:08 am
Favorite tradition is putting up and lighting the Swedish angel chimes (candles create the movement and the chimes spin around tinkling little bells as they go) that my late mother used every year.
Favorite memory is our candlelit Christmas Eve service at church with the choir singing Silent Night/Night of Silence. The piece begins in complete darkness with a single candle lit. By the end of the song, everyone has lit an individual candle by passing the flame from one person to another . So powerful!
(((hugs)))
December 14, 2006 at 8:28 am
1. My In-Laws have a tradition of finishing the Christmas meal with Rice Pudding served in individual cups. One cup has an almond in it, the rest are almond -free. Whoever finds the almond gets to open the first present. This system worked for them for about 40 years, until my brother-in-law brought his own almond to slip into his own cup. Cheater! Of course, I’ve always wondered about this tradition, as it turns out my husband is the only member of his family to be allergic to almonds. Hmm, is mommy dearest trying to kill off her youngest? We’ll never know… 🙂
2. When I was 2 years old, Christmas day was spent at the local hospital, as my parents had decided to give me a little brother for Christmas that year (I know, not the best gift, but it’s the thought that counts, right?) So there I was, in my little white tights and new black mary janes, all dressed up in my Christmas dress (I think it was Christmas plaid and black velvet) sitting on the waiting room couch all by myself. There was one old lady there too, but she was asleep I think. Next to me was a big dish of Brach’s butterscotch candies. By the time my brother had been born I’d had more than enough candy, and I was convince my brother was Jesus, after all, Jesus was born on Christmas Day, right? Life was simpler as a 2 yr old.
December 14, 2006 at 9:11 am
My favorite tradition used to be that we (my brother and I) always got new pajamas from my grandparents on Christmas Eve. Now that my grandparents are gone and I’m grown and married. I go to my husband’s grandparent’s for a traditional Italian Christmas Eve complete with the “seven fishes”. My favorite Christmas memory is coming down stairs as a child and seeing all the gifts under the tree then opening fantastic little gifts after in my overstuffed stocking made for me by my mother.
December 14, 2006 at 10:30 am
1. During the year my extended family tends to drink innocuous beverages year-round. Summer time brings cool lemonaide at birthday parties and when the leaves fall there’s hot cider on the stove. For some reason our family tends to elect for adult beverages on Christmas eve… and, well, go a bit overboard. This lends to after-dinner gift-giving sentences like, “Look! A beautiful soup-a pot, just like I wanted!” and overly animated reindeer games. Per tradition, we pile into vehicles driven by family members who have not indulged in liquid holiday cheer. We all pile into the pews for a candle-lit midnight service. My brother always wispers the exact same thing into people’s ears each year… “We’re all going to Hell!”.
2. My favorite membry of the holidays… About seven years ago my family was at my cousin’s home. Her husband (cousin Scotty) prepared a huge bonfire in the back yard so that we might stand around it while drinking our (yes, once again) liquid holiday cheer. The entire family watched from the living room window as he prepared the fire. Scott doused one end of the wood pile with lighter fluid then started the fire with a match. Scott then brilliantly decided to douse the other side of the bonfire with the remainder of the lighter fluid. In a nanosecond we saw the fire jump from one end of the massive pile of wood to the other, then up the thin line of lighter fluid to Scott’s body. He quickly threw the metal box and proceeded to roll into the snow. Wendy, age 10, said: “Wow. He really knows how to stop, drop, and roll.”
…each year we like to say, “Remember the year that Scott nearly burned himself to death on Christmas eve?”. “Yeah. Thank God he knew how to stop, drop and roll”. We’ve even gone so far as to wrap up the burned glove and gift him with it years later.
December 14, 2006 at 12:15 pm
1. My favourite Christmas tradition is that we have bought the new Swarkovski Christmas star ornament each year that we’ve been married. We have 6 now and they are a really lovely reminder of the passing years.
2. My favourite Christmas memory is having lots of people who had no where to go round for lunch and realising we didn’t have enough table space for all our guests 🙂
December 14, 2006 at 12:39 pm
My mom was the queen of keeping the kid’s busy while she made Christmas dinner. We had a long list of activities always planned for Christmas Eve, but my favorite was always….if there was snow, we would build the biggest snowman that we possibly could. It would involve grown-ups, kids, chairs, ladders. The tallest was about 8 feet tall and he stayed around til spring!
December 14, 2006 at 12:39 pm
1. My family gathers in the living room on Christmas eve and we read “How the Grinch Stole Christmas,” “Twas The Night Before Christmas,” “The Tomten,” and “The Tomten and the Fox.” We’ve started making snarky comments throughout (e.g. during “The Grinch”:
“–and he did hear a sound rising over the snow-”
“We’ve been robbed!”
“Thank god for insurance!”
“Uh, yes Officer, it was a 40– I mean, 52″ plasma television…”)
2. The first time we started smart-ass commentary we were all laughing so hard we were crying.
(runner up to 1. On the first night of Hanukkah my dad makes up a song about the Hanukkah bunny to the tune of O Tanenbaum. My dad would buy my brother a flashlight because he’d forget every year that he’d done it the previous year, so it became tradition. I have at least 3 mini-maglights).
Great contest! It’s made me all gooey about the holidays!
December 14, 2006 at 4:27 pm
1) My favourite holiday tradition is playing crokinole after Christmas dinner and throughout the holiday season. It can get pretty crazy, too, especially if we’ve all been drinking. For those who don’t know, crokinole is a game where you shoot checkers at the centre of a board – it’s simple enough for kids to play and for people to learn quickly, but there can be a lot of skill involved if you’re playing with people who know how.
2) My favourite holiday memory… is really hard to decide. They just seem to keep getting better. One that I like is the gift hunts I used to send my brother on when he was young enough to appreciate it. I’d have eight or ten rhyming clues, complete with tacky puns (oh, come on, this was when I was about 12), and he’d have to go all around the house and up and down the stairs a few times before he found his gift.
December 14, 2006 at 4:29 pm
inthe days when my dad was not a pastor, heehee -just a lil disclaimer, he would drink some disgusting rocknrye stuff…cuz grandpaw did, climb up on our snowy roof with bells, stomp around, and jingle the bells and try to make us believe santa was up there. inevitably, he would falloff the roof and my mother would rush us to bed so we would not know it was dad, tuck us in, before seeing if he was alive or dead in hopefully a snow drift.
now my kids, are dreidels. we make cait is awesome!rdboard dreidel costumes and spin the kids around n round til they fall over and see which letter they land on.
December 14, 2006 at 5:09 pm
Favorite tradition? Cross country skiin after drinking waaaay too many egg-nogs.
Favorite memory? Besides getting that really cool purple Donny and Mary guitar? I guess it’s more of a tragedy than a story. I used to write notes to Santa every year and I guess Dad had worked too many long hours signing his name to documents because he decided it would be cute for “Santa” to write me back one year and he signed the letter his actual first and last name..thanks for the therapy bills dad!
December 14, 2006 at 6:14 pm
Mother! tell me how to do the contest.
Charles’s owner
December 14, 2006 at 9:42 pm
Favorite tradition: my immediate family (mom, dad, me and now my husband) have crepes for our Christmas dinner. It doesn’t matter what day it is on the calendar, when it’s just us (no grandparents, cousins, etc) and there’s a pile of Mom’s homemade crepes, a plate of sausages, bowls of berries, sour cream, sugar, butter and syrup on the table, I know it’s Christmas.
Favorite memory: Reading “The Grinch Who Stole Christmas” to my cousin’s son in my Grandma’s living room where she read it to me every Christmas when I was a little girl.
(thanks for that happy trip)
December 14, 2006 at 10:37 pm
My favorite holiday tradition is our breakfasts. We have this really elaborate coffee cake shaped like x-mas trees. Breakfast is always at 9 and then we open our presents after breakfast.
My favorite x-mas memory is the year my parents bought a playstation. My brother wanted it so bad and thought my parents weren’t going to get us one. I think it’s one of the only times since he was very little I’ve ever seen my brother cry.
Have a great holiday!
Gwen
December 15, 2006 at 12:23 pm
My favorite holiday tradition was when my younger brother and I would watch all Christmassy family films a whole week leading upto Christmas every year. The films were broadcast on tv everyday and it was such a nice feeling to watch them during the winter break with tons of gingerbread cookies and christmas cake my mom always made. I miss it so much. I think we’ve watched ‘The Night they Saved Christmas’ countless times!
My favorite holiday memory is waking up on Christmas day, not expecting to see ANY presents under our mini tree as usual (we weren’t Christians then but somehow we did have a tree) but after a few hints from my parents, my bro and I realised that there were actually presents for us there!!! I got an amazing necklace that was wrapped like a toffee and hung like a bauble so that it wasn’t too easy to find. I think my brother got a remote controlled car.
Siiighh…I miss those days when life was so simple and all I had to worry about was whether dinner was going to have sausages in it or not instead of all veggies…..bleeeuuch..
December 15, 2006 at 2:27 pm
Hmmm…my favorite Christmas. Well, it sounds odd, but when my youngest was a year old, he was sick on Christmas Day. My mother and I ended up taking him to Urgent Care, which was packed, and we were there three hours, then 90 minutes at the pharmacy afterwards. Meanwhile, hubby and my dad were at home struggling to figure out Christmas dinner. As awful as it sounds, everyone just took an “oh well” attitude, and we ended up having a great time. It was as if we just appreciated the fact that we were all together and let go of the usual family drama. Much wine was poured at the end of the day. Maybe that’s why I remember it so fondly!
December 15, 2006 at 5:43 pm
My favorite holiday tradition is driving in to town one night before christmas and looking at all the christmas lights. We live in a small town, so it is fun to drive up and down all the side streets to see what people have done. We have noticed that the less prosperous neighborhoods have the best displays.
My favorite holiday memory has to be watching my Mom make the dressing/stuffing. She died when I was a teenager, so it is something from my childhood that I always remember. I loved her dressing and have never made dressing as good as Mom’s.
December 17, 2006 at 7:30 pm
Tradition: Growing up, our Christmas tree was in a room that could be closed off. So Christmas morning, we were able to open our stockings immediately, but we’d have to wait until after breakfast for the rest – all 4 kids would line up youngest to oldest before we were allowed in the room. Santa never wrapped, so this was a great way to keep up the suspense.
Memory: It has to be a collection of memories that revolve around my crazy family and board games. Many, MANY fun memories were made around a table of Trivial Pursuit, Taboo, Guesstures, etc. One big, loud, laughing family.
December 17, 2006 at 9:48 pm
Growing up, my favorite holiday tradition was taking out the box of Christmas decorations and putting the Santa doorknob cover on the kitchen door. It was a sweet little crocheted cover with sequin eyes and my mother still has it. When we have kids, I will ask her for it.
My favorite holiday memory was the neighborhood caroling our block association did. There were usually about 10-15 of us and we’d go door to door up and down our street for about 4 blocks and sing 1-2 carols at each building. There were kids and grownups and it was so much fun!
December 18, 2006 at 9:15 am
Favorite Christmas Tradition: Every year since my daughter was born I’ve bought a new Christmas-themed picture book. She’s 18 now and she’s not interested in them, but I still buy one. Haven’t found a good one yet for this year but I’m thinking it’ll be the new edition of Dicken’s Christmas Carol that’s out this year. (That’ll be about the 6th or 7th copy I have of The Christmas Carol.)
Favorite Christmas memory: There are so many…one Christmas someone in the family got a present packed in those packing peanuts that are little convex circles. And the whole family ended up drawing googly eyes on them and sticking them up behind their glasses. We were all laughing so hard. (You sort of had to be there.)
And another Christmas my brother-in-law and husband and cousins and I spent a large chunk of the day drinking lots of wine and playing Parcheesi…the games were pretty wild by the end of the evening.
And I remember my aunt giving my daughter her first baby doll when she was not quite yet two. She was so excited and when we finally got the doll out of the wrapping she refused to put it down for the rest of the evening.
But I think my best Christmas memory was the Christmas I got my first two-wheeler. Apparently my parents were confused because there it was next to the tree, all shiny and blue, and I didn’t say anything about it. They finally asked me why I wasn’t excited about the bike and it turns out that I didn’t think it was for me. Once they convinced me that, yes, it was mine, I was excited. But I can still remember thinking that something so wonderful probably wasn’t mine….and then the thrill when I realized that it was.
December 18, 2006 at 10:07 pm
I loved it when we would visit my grandparents in Oregon. On Christmas Eve, my grandmother always made oyster soup. We kids, of course, thought this was disgusting. But, if we ate just one oyster, we were allowed to open a present. She used to make us open our mouths to prove we had swallowed it. LOL We slept in the attic room, and I stayed up as long as I could trying to listen for the reindeer above me. I sure miss those days, and my grandma. It’s my favorite memory and tradition, all rolled into one.
December 19, 2006 at 5:58 am
My fondest Christmas memory is the year I had Chicken Pox over Christmas. I was 7 and wayyy too embarrassed to come upstairs (my room was in the basement) and have company see me with spots all over me. Our minister had come over to share the holiday with my family. He took my sister’s eye liner pencil and drew dots all over his face and came downstairs to ask me to come up so he wouldn’t be the only spotty person in the Christmas photos. 🙂 Made me feel SO much better, and I came up and enjoyed the holiday despite having spots. 🙂
My favorite Christmas tradition is lighting candles and singing on Christmas evening. We sing carols and hymns, and thank God for all of our family members, and our lives, etc. It really draws us close as a family, and it’s such a peaceful way to end a happy holiday. 🙂
December 19, 2006 at 1:51 pm
1: Tradition: I married into this one! Every year my husband’s family buys a santa candle and spends the week before Christmas burning and mutilating it with toothpicks and other items that will light on fire. Typically by Christmas day there’s nothing left but a couple of melty black wax feet.
2. Favorite memory: I love getting the tree. This year was no exception because I’m pregnant! Wandering around in the snow is hard enough without the extra bulk, but I still consider it the first time the whole “family” has gone out together to do something special.
December 19, 2006 at 6:54 pm
Tell me your (1) favorite or craziest holiday tradition and (2) your favorite holiday memory
Let’s see, Craziest tradition is that we make lists of what we would like, we call them Gimmie Pig lists, and we then post them on the Fridge. If we didn’t do that I wouldn’t ever get anything I like.
My favorite holiday memory is that for several years as my mom was a single mom, the Christmas tree fell down. We’d get ready to go downstairs, and mom would go first to light the tree, and we’d hear her say, Oh No, the tree fell down. Then we’d wait until she put it back up. This happened several years in a row, until she learned to tie it to the ceiling.
December 23, 2006 at 3:32 pm
Oh missed out on this… it was interesting to read through everyone’s comments, though!
(And W/o a Trace… I finally just started watching it, so good!)