Today, I would love to share with you our Christmas to-do list full of traditions.

Hello Christmas Time!

In the words of Frank Sinatra:

“It’s that time of year
When the world falls in love
Every song you hear seems to say
Merry Christmas”

There is absolutely no other season that holds so many traditions, magical memories or beautiful sentiment. The birth of Jesus cannot be matched, so of course, this holiday is special and more meaningful than others!

A Christmas To-Do List Full of Traditions

I told you awhile ago that I was a Christmas fanatic, and it is true! I just adore everything about it, but the meaning of it has obviously changed over the years. As a child, the excitement and anticipation I would feel waiting for Santa was irreplaceable!

My Christmas To Do List is mainly full of traditional things we do each and every year without fail. I want to write them down because I love lists and I hope you can get some inspiration too 🙂

This post was first shared in 2015! But we have updated it a little in 2020, and added in some new things too.

I wrote this post before I was a mom, and boy have things changed since then. Christmas is even more special through my sweet toddlers eyes.

Here are some of our favorite things to do! Also, join us on Instagram and Instagram stories for more of our holiday!

Drive around looking at Christmas lights with our favorite hot drinks (coffee for me, hot chocolate for him).

One of the longest Christmas traditions for us is driving around looking at lights. I used to do this with my parents on Christmas Eve every year. I have the fondest memories of this!

Bake and decorate sugar cookies with my mom.

Another favorite tradition is baking and decorating cookies with my mom. We have so much fun doing this!

Send out all the Christmas cards.

I am still old school and buy traditional cards with a picture of us inside. I send them to EVERYONE because I love it!

Exchange ornaments with my best friends of 30 years.

We started this tradition when I got married years ago since I moved 1500 miles away to California and we wouldn’t actually be able to see each other. We decided to start exchanging ornaments since we both had our own trees now. This is our 8th Christmas to do this, and I can’t wait to meet up. We have started doing really fun and unique ornaments. The one I got her this year is totally nostalgic of our favorite time period, the 90s. I know she reads this, so I will wait to share the details with you 🙂 p.s – she is the friend from the kool-aid stand of 1993.

So, let me tell you a story about our first Christmas tradition. She and I were both total FANATICS of Christmas as children. Our excitement was so intense, that a few days before Christmas we COULD NOT contain ourselves. I couldn’t sleep, time was moving way to slow and by December 23rd, I was beside myself. We decided (about age 6), to have a Christmas Eve Eve celebration to make time go by faster. Every December 23rd until age 20 when I got married, we would get together, have  a sleep over, exchange gifts and stay up all night eating popcorn, coloring, listening to music, and dreaming of Christmas day.

I’m on the left 😉 When we were younger, we would alternate houses we stayed at. The popcorn would be popped, hot chocolate made and we would camp out on the bedroom floor with all our favorite Christmas music playing non stop while coloring in our Christmas coloring books. I remember we wouldn’t sleep a wink, we just stayed up all night talking and thinking about what Santa would be bringing us the next night.

It has been so many years since we did this. Now we are both married, living in different towns, but we still have our gift exchange and make an effort to set aside one day to do so!

Here’s some favorite’s she has given me over the years:

Christmas get together and gift exchange with my other best friend of 30 years.

My other friend and I also have a gift exchange every year. We also have a tradition each December to meet up and have some sort of celebration. Ours has changed over the years. As kids, we always had a sleep over, full of tons of junk food, candy and a huge stack of Christmas movies.

As adults, we always try to do something fun when we exchange gifts. Last year, we went to the Christmas tree lighting and shopped downtown. I can’t wait to see what we will do this year 🙂

Get your children a new ornament to add to their little Christmas tree.

I started doing a tiny Christmas tree for Amelia when she was a baby. Every year, we add a tiny ornament to it. She now gets to add them on the tree herself! This will be her 3rd year for it 🙂

Buy and eat the obligatory popcorn tin.

This has to happen. Since I was about four, maybe sooner, we have always bought a huge popcorn tin for Christmas, to munch on all season. My little brother, seven years younger, and I loved this tradition. We couldn’t wait to watch our favorite Christmas movie and eat the three favorite. My favorite was the cheddar, his was the caramel.

My husband grew up doing this too, so we always try to do this every Christmas.

Bake up my traditional Christmas treats for the neighbors.

I give out food gifts to all my neighbors each year. I will be sharing some of those recipes in my newsletter, coming out VERY soon. Sign up below if you would like to get it this month 🙂

Christmas Eve Service at Church

This is one of my favorite traditions. I love the candlelit service, singing Christmas carols on Christmas Eve. With the pandemic in full swing still, we will probably be doing the church service online from home. Who knows? This might be a new tradition for us too!

Stockings and gifts with the husband on Christmas Eve

We’ve been doing our little Christmas on Christmas Eve since we moved back to Texas in 2010. He has always worked evenings and holidays, and since Christmas Day HAS to be done at my parents house in the morning (this tradition can’t be broken), we always do ours the night before. He used to get off work around midnight and head home. I would wait up for him and the minute he got home, we would do our stockings and gifts. He is going through the police academy now, but we plan on keeping this one too.

We may not get snow on Christmas (although I can remember it did ONCE and it was awesome), but we still love this season so much. It is actually going to be in the 80s by the end of this week, but I will keep pretending it’s a winter wonderland outside. Really it’s the tradition, the joy, the peace all around that makes Christmas so wonderful.

What are some tradition you do every year? I’d love for you to share them with me!

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