Memory Lane Friday - Holiday Traditions

Hope that you are having a very nice Christmas Eve.  Today is Memory Lane Friday, and the theme is holiday traditions.  All are welcome to blog on the subject and link up.

I recently scanned the pictures from my grandparents' photo album.  And there were tons and tons of Christmas pictures.  Too many to post, to be truthful.  But I wanted to share a few of them.

You have to study this one closely to realize it is a Christmas picture, but I'm sitting next to a poinsettia, so it must be.  I like this picture because guess what?  I look just like Cort.  Or he looks just like me.

We would always visit both sets of grandparents over Christmas.  Sometimes it might be a weekend early or a weekend later, but we would go and enjoy food and family.

This is the Christmas I got my furry Snoopy pillow cover.  It was rather pink.

Also, note my awesome stuffed Garfield riding the pretty pony.

I also had a stuffed Odie. 

Every year my grandmother would get me a fancy doll for Christmas, in spite of the fact that I was a tomboy and didn't want to play with dolls.  But she tried so hard.

This is the Scarlett O'Hara Madame Alexander doll.

I still have it, in it's original box (although the box is a bit beat up). 

Oh yes, and you can't see it to well, but I appear to be sitting in a Tonka truck box.

And of course, I mustn't forget to include a picture of kid brother Taylor.

This is the year he got his bubble mower and a huge Tonka truck, mentioned in the picture above. 

This is my aunt Pam with my dad.  This must've been taken before dinner, because afterwards they would've been stuffed too full to smile. 

Christmas Eve morning we'd head out to breakfast.  This was a special tribute to my Mom.  My Dad always said she did so much work (baking, wrapping presents, making gifts) that she deserved to eat out for a meal.  So off we would go to someplace like Cracker Barrel or the Silver Diner.  Along the way, my Dad would butcher singing the Feliz Navidad song when it came on the radio, and my brother and I would practically fall out of our seatbelts in laughter, then beg him to sing it again.

We always opened presents on Christmas Eve, after attending a Christmas Eve service and eating a ham dinner.  We would always bug my dad, and he'd say, "No presents until it's dark outside!"

Then he'd tease us.  He'd say, "Hmmm, maybe we should just wait until Christmas Day this year..."

Below...me with my mom, the year I got my highly desired Animator. 

Overall, our Christmases were pretty simple.  The main theme?  The main tradition?  Just being with family. Which makes for very nice memories indeed.

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Next week is a 'no theme' week on Memory Lane Friday.