Tuesday, January 4, 2011

Christmas Traditions

Ok...so I know Christmas was over a week ago now but I'm not quite ready to let go of my Christmas spirit. My family doesn't have a lot of Christmas traditions but the ones we do have I absolutely refuse to let go of. Let me share with you my three favorite traditions:

1. In-N-Out on Christmas Eve

I hear that my sister Rachel started this one way back in the day. Apparently my family had no Christmas traditions at the time and she wanted to create one. And being an oh-so-chic SoCal family she decided that eating at In-N-Out on Christmas Eve would be the perfect tradition for us. And all these years later you can still find various members of the Thatcher clan at In-N-Out on Chapman Ave in Placentia on Christmas Eve. I know it's not your typical Christmas Eve dinner but we love it. When my sister was on her mission in France we even sent her a whole box full of In-N-Out memorabilia so she wouldn't feel so homesick...and I'm sure we would have threw in a burger and fries if it wouldn't have gone bad on the way to Nice. Gotta love In-N-Out.

2. Crepes and little smokies on Christmas morning

When my niece Emily and I were kids we could not get enough little smokies on Christmas. I swear we ate twenty of those things a piece. And we also devoured the scrumptious crepes my dad would whip up and cover them in tons of homemade maple syrup and powdered sugar. This year my dad thought he might get out of having to make a big breakfast on Christmas, but little did he know his 24-year-old daughter would throw quite the tantrum at the mere suggestion of that plan. No way was I missing out on Christmas crepes. And just like always, he couldn't say no to his little girl and the tradition lived on.

3. Lucky Charms under the tree

When I was growing up my mom would never let me have sugary cereal in the house. I was forced to eat nasty grown-up cereal like Cheerios and Raisin Bran that would inevitably be covered in sugar as soon as my mom turned her back. So every Christmas it became a funny little treat to get a box of Lucky Charms as a present. And still to this day I look forward to that magically delicious treat every year.

So what are your favorite Christmas traditions?