Traditionally...

For as long as I can remember, presumably since before I was born, our Christmas traditions were pretty much set in stone:  Christmas Eve was spent with my mom's side of the family.  We would congregate at someone's house, usually my parents', gorge ourselves on delicious food, play silly White Elephant-type games, open presents and just enjoy being together.  On Christmas Morning, my Mom, Dad, and I would exchange our gifts (or we did the Santa thing when I was little), then head over to my dad's side of the family's festivities.  When I married Michael we did the Christmas Eve thing with my mom's side of the family, did our own Christmas morning, then headed over to his parents' house for the rest of Christmas Day.  Once Michael started the nite shift, we had to post-pone Christmas morning till Christmas afternoon (which was difficult with a kid who really wanted his Santa present when he woke up!), but we still did Christmas Eve with my mom's side of the family.

This year, Michael is on daytime again (praise the Lord!) and we can do Christmas MORNING again, hooray!  Plus, there's another kid around now... it's Callen's first Christmas!  However, Christmas Eve plans are a bit of whack.  My Grandma Linda passed away in September... and we are all still trying to work through that.  Michael and I offered to host Christmas Eve at our house this year, but most of the family has really not even wanted to acknowledge Christmas... it's difficult knowing that Grandma wouldn't be with us.  And now with Christmas just days away, it appears everyone just wants to do their own thing this year.  My uncle and his family were going to come, but since Michael and Preston were diagnosed with Strep throat on Tuesday, they decided better safe than sorry.  I can understand that.  My parents are coming over to our house for Christmas Eve... we'll have dinner, go to our church's service and then come back for treats and presents.  It seems really weird to be making such plans... plans that don't include that whole side of the family, because that's all I've known... for 30 years!  But, new traditions are good too.  It's a part of life to be open to change... some for the better, some not so pleasant, some completely out of our control.

So, we'll see how things go with our new tradition this Christmas.  Either way, we are blessed to have the precious family and friends that we have, and for the true reason for Christmas in the first place - Happy birthday, Jesus!