Tis the season...so I think I will share a tradition or two with you that are among my favorites. This one is not from my family, but when the fella told me about it I immedialtely wished it was. This is how it went:
When he was a kid, everyone went to Grandma and Grandpa's farm for Christmas. It was a large family, with dozens of grandchildren. The rule was to keep the childrens' presents hidden in the barns and other out-buildings until the kids were asleep on Christmas Eve. Then the parents would put all the presents into the dining room where the main Christmas tree was, it was the only room big enough for all those packages.
Shortly after Christmas Eve dinner, as the parents were getting all the kids ready for bed, Grandpa would get out his old 12 guage shotgun and start cleaning it. He would grumble under his breath about that old fat man jamming up his house every year and he was tired of it and was going to put a stop to it. The beauty of this was that the older kids would tell the younger kids what was going on so Grandpa didn't have to make much of an explanation, he just cleaned and grumped. The word would spread around to all the kids that Grandpa was going to shoot Santa Claus...the tension was high !
The next morning, just after the rooster made his first crow, Grandpa went out on the porch and lit off that 12 guage a couple of times and started yelling at that old fat son of a gun cluttering up the dining room again and so on...the terrified kids would charge down the stairs fearing for Santa's life and be met by the sight of the dining room filled to spilling over with presents.
I love Christmas traditions, I love the season and the memories of my littlies when we were able to surprise them. We had lots of things we did every year, some of them I see carried on to their families. Got a good one? Let's share. I'll give ya more of ours later.