Do you watch football every Thanksgiving? Does an elf sit on your shelf before Christmas? Or do you spin a dreidel on Chanukah? We all have our traditions to personalize the holidays and make them feel special.
But some traditions are more common than others. So we want to know... what holiday traditions do you follow each year? Tell us to win a $50 Etsy gift card and a Thanksgiving Thankful Tree Kit!
To get you started, here are some of the non-traditional traditions SheSpeaks staff members celebrate during the holidays:
We do a Thanksgiving Tree every year. Everyone gets leaves and they write what they are thankful for and then we hang them from branches that we collect together. It's very sweet. - Aliza Enter below to win your own Thanksgiving Thankful Tree Kit, plus a $50 Etsy gift card!
Each kid gets a new ornament for our Christmas tree every year. We buy it from a store that has tons of ornaments - they even write their name and year on it. My kids are now 21 and 16 so we have tons of them, everything from soccer, gymnastics and baseball to graduations and driving. - Missy
Instead of gifts every night for Chanukah, we spend some nights doing activities with the kids, usually involving food and a giant mess. We've tried making sushi (a sticky-rice mess), fondue (a chocolate mess) and pasta (the biggest mess of all - flour was everywhere!) - Susan
We make homemade pizza on Christmas Eve, for every year of my life I can remember except one! We even make the crust from scratch and everyone picks their own toppings. Even my teenage son calls it "the best tradition ever." - Carol
My New Year's Eve tradition is to make a fancy dinner at home and skip the crowds. In addition to getting some decadent food, we try a new signature cocktail, candles & mood music so we can feel like we've transformed our house into a swanky restaurant. - Emily
*One lucky commenter, Tweeter or Instagrammer will be chosen at random to receive a $50 Etsy gift card and a Thanksgiving Thankful Tree (if the tree is sold out, the prize will instead be a $75 Etsy gift card.) Giveaway is open through November 25th, 2018 to U.S. residents at least 18 years of age. Entrants must be a member of SheSpeaks. If you are not a member, click here to join. Winner will be notified by email.
Update: Thanks to all who entered! Congrats to our winner, SheSpeaks member peter26.
Spending time with my family since they all live away from us. Any time with them is a blessing for which I am thankful. I'm also thankful for a roof over my head, clothes upon my back and food in my belly.
My favorite holiday tradition is the gift exchange we do every Christmas eve with our family and friends.
Since we can't be together on Thanksgiving. It follows along the lines of the game you used to play at school, pass it on. We pick someone new each year, they come up with a great or hopefully great dish for Thanksgiving dinner. Then that person call the next family member of their choice and tells them the recipe and so on and so on. Then we all make the dish and eat it as it was told to us by the previous family member. We never get to write it down and we get the recipe on the same day as everyone else, so it's a wonder we all ever get to eat the dish. At the end of dinner we call the original family member and tell them what we made and how it was. Who ever gets it right the most gets a gift card and whomever gets it wrong the worst gets to plan Christmas dinner alone. Some dishes have never been eaten, but the laughter and fun is all its about.
So many traditions!! I love the symbolism and meaning of the orange we put in our stockings each year. I also love going Christmas caroling at the nursing homes.
Hosting Christmas Eve dinner is my favorite holiday tradition.
My favorite tradition is building gingerbread houses with my family!
My favorite holiday tradition is baking chocolate chip cookies with my kids.
My favorite holiday tradition is baking chocolate chip cookies with my kids.
I always work during the holidays so after work I get together with coworkers for the holiday meal.
Winter break! Just staying indoors and sleeping in
my mom makimg tamales
We throw a Christmas Eve party every year & change up our theme each year. This year will be a pajama party! The last time we did that was the one year we hosted at my grandma's. She passed away in May and we wanted to do a pajama party again, in a way of remembering her. We do a secret Santa gift exchange with cousins, parents and significant others. Every year we draw names during our Thanksgiving party and exchange at our Christmas Eve party. I'm the cook and always make way too much food, staying up the night before into morning and look forward to that stress every year! We also do the Elf on the Shelf for the kids which my husband goes crazy with! Then on Christmas Eve night, we go outside and the kids sprinkle reindeer food we made earlier in the night all over the lawn. Before bed, the kids leave out cookies from the piles that I've baked and milk for Santa and carrots for the reindeer, of course.
my favorite holiday tradition is making pies and cakes with my son for Thanksgiving dinner, Matzoh Ball Soup and lighting the Menorah for Chanukkah. ANd since we quasi celebrate Christmas I would say decorating the tree with my son and wrapping presents are my favorite traditions for the holidays
We enjoy using multiple advent calendars every year. We have some that we use every year (such as a personalized Christmas tree decoration that hangs on the wall that we put an ornament on every day) and we get others for one time use (such as ones where you just open a door on a paper card or open a door to find a piece of chocolate). I've enjoyed using advent calendars to count down the days until Christmas since I was a kid and now my daughter enjoys it, too
I look forward to baking Christmas cookies.