#52Stories, Week 50, Which of your childhood holiday traditions have you carried on into adulthood. What new traditions have you started ?

Making a fruit cake is the obvious tradition which I have continued. (Although it has been missing the last couple of years since I became a bit of a gypsy.)

I still send cards each year, not as many as I did once. Not because there are less people to send to; more that I make my own and lack of organisation often means I run out of time. It is also more costly these days as postal services struggle to run their businesses. But as connected as I am on the web, I still believe in snail mail. If we all give up and don’t use it – it will be lost forever. (In New Zealand anyway. Other countries who complain about their services still have effective services operating today. Don’t get me started on the indefinite amount of time it takes to send and receive mail on three teeny islands.)

So, making cards is a new thing and there have been many different designs over the years (I just found about 15 or 16 years of photos !).

Packaging. This has become a real part of the process for me. The thought which goes into the gift and then the presentation.

Writing a Christmas newsletter to update friends and family of the happenings during the year.

Decorating with a theme. This too has gone a bit by the by since moving around more. White tree/Red & green tree/Gold tree/Silver tree/Red & white tree

I have a bit of a thing about snowmen – like Frosty who I made some years ago.

I have a couple of other snowman ornaments packed away. I like penguins too – not so many of those ornaments though. Santas too – big fat round ones, tall skinny wizardy looking ones; and then houses. “Claire’s Card Shop” which was given to me one year as well as a gingerbread house and others lit by led lights run on batteries.

Then there is bunting – nowhere really to put this up this year so it is safely in a box with the others waiting for “one day” to arrive.

Carols by candlelight, or just carols in the park. One thing I miss from Wellington is the Onslow Brass Band. They would walk around the streets, stop at intervals and play carols, collecting for charity at the same time. Hearing the strains of a carol played across the valley or at the bottom of the drive always had that “feelgood feeling”. Like Christmas really is here.

Going to church for Christmas Eve carols, sometimes going to the same church each year, other times going somewhere else, a new faith or a church in a different suburb.

Checking out the Christmas light displays. This probably started when we lived in Hamilton when Lauren was 2 or 3 and we went to the lights at the Temple in Tuhikaramea. Lots of late night driving to streets and suburbs far afield ensued. Sometimes we’d go after the Christmas Eve church service as well. This year, no car, so it will depend how far we need to walk.

Some traditions have gone for now; retired – letters from Santa, snowy footprints under the tree, cookies and milk left on a table and water outside for the reindeer.