It’s just over a week until Christmas and I started thinking about traditions. We didn’t have a lot of traditions in my family growing up. We all loved Christmas and enjoyed the time with family, but there is nothing that we did every year that I could call a tradition, more like routine.
When Cooper was born I knew I wanted to start traditions straight away. I wanted him to have things in his life that he could pass onto his family, something that will remind him of all the wonderful traditions we shared as a family. To start with I wanted to start him a collection of “something” after a lot of thought I decided on Swarovski crystal figurines. I had read in a magazine once that a women bought her kids new pj’s and a christmas ornament every year and gave it to them on Christmas eve. The kids would then have new pj’s to wake up in on Christmas day. So I decided to do this with my own twist.

Last year Cooper was 20 days old on Christmas day, so it is all a little bit of a blur! I do however remember he wanted to be fed as soon as my Mum put all the plates on the table for lunch! We bought Cooper his first Swarovski – the Kris Bear 2008 Christmas ornament. I really loved it because he was a December baby so a Christmas ornament seemed to fit and it has his birth year engraved on it.

This year as a tribute to our trip to Disneyland, we have chosen the 2009 limited edition Mickey Mouse. As part of the tradition we have a rule that each figurine must represent something we did or something he was interested in that year.

Traditions to me are important, I think they help future generations feel connected to the past. It makes me sad to think we don’t have any traditions, the few I feel were traditions have been lost and forgotten over time as my parents were never vigilant in keeping them alive. I really hope Cooper will look back one day at all of his Swarovski’s (that he will never be allowed to touch, hold or breath on! LOL) and be able to paint a picture of his life.

Another tradition we started was reading the book The Night Before Christmas on Christmas Eve. I have always loved that book and I can’t wait to read it again next week.

I would love to hear about some of your fabulous traditions!

Jen xx