December is my favourite month in the whole year. First of all, it is one of the coolest month in the year and the wintry snowy image always comes to mind. Secondly, it is the last month of the year, and it means that a new year and new beginning is approaching. Thirdly, I receive my bonus in this month and usually I indulge myself and my family a little more by spending that little more. Lastly, December has Dongzhi Festival or Winter Solstice Festival (冬至) and Christmas Day, which are 2 great occasions for my family to get together.
We are not a Christian nor Catholic family, but we love to celebrate Christmas in our own happy ways. I always respect how Christmas is celebrated in churches, and how my Christian and Catholic friends celebrated in their traditional ways.
It probably started with the childhood TVC jingle “Metro Christmas Magic…” which I can still hum out the song at a snap of the fingers. And it also gets associated with my childhood memories of a rare Christmas period visit to a Metro store full of white Teddies. My parents hardly bought us any presents as we were from humble background. But on that particular day during Christmas to the Metro store, they bought us a set of UNO cards to play.
Childhood memories last forever, especially if they are beautiful ones. My parents gave me a memorable childhood in simple ways. I was brought up in a strong foundation of love and this guided me on how I would want to give my own children their memorable childhood and a contented one.
Our first Christmas tree was set up in our house when Missy was only 1 yo. From then on, this Christmas tree has stayed with us year after year till today. It still looks as good.
For the kids, setting up the Christmas tree has become a tradition and something to look forward to as a family bonding activity. I simply love to sit by the Christmas tree and watch the dancing lights in the dark. It gives me a sense of peace and contentment. Even in my workplace, I feel less stressed just by catching a glimpse of the big Christmas tree by the full glass window pane.
Over the years, Christmas become a family affair, when family members gather and friends meet up. We love that it is a period to catch up with family members and friends over good food and good party mood. Our children catch up with their cousins and look forward to “Santa Claus” giving presents to everybody. We love gifting our beloved ones and seeing happy smiles on everyone’s faces. We enjoy throwing parties and party hopping which no other occasions in the year will we do so much merry-making.
As much as how Christmas is so commercialized in Singapore and how the cashiers are ringing non-stop by our endless shopping lists, we still love to join the busy shoppers spending to the delight of the merchants. There aren’t many occasions and excuses to splurge for our loved ones apart from birthdays. The gifts need not be expensive, but they have to be carefully chosen from our hearts. During this period, we teach the kids to share by gifting needy children their pre-loved toys and teddies.
We enjoy bringing the kids to walk down Orchard Road to admire Christmas lightings. It has also become a family activity to travel down the busy shopping street in our car as the kids count the number of Christmas trees all around. I know all these memories will last me forever, and I hope my children will remember fondly of these happy memories.
In recent years, booking staycations at hotels along Orchard and Marina area has gradually become a yearly “holiday” for us so that we can walk back to our hotels after viewing the Christmas lightings. This year was an exception though as we had a short getaway to Legoland.
Oh, and the Christmas songs. Why do they sound so beautiful? My favourite is “I am dreaming of a white Christmas”, another childhood memory song which appeared in my Primary school song book.
And about every photo related to Christmas on Pinterest looks so pretty. This photo below is probably my best Pinterest worthy shot. Wanna guess where this was taken? 🙂
This brings me to looking for Christmas ideas for art and crafts on Pinterest. We did our own Christmas cards and snowflakes 2 years back.
And this year, even though I had pinned many Christmas ideas on Pinterest board, sadly, I could not find time to make with the children. I had wanted to do this with the kids this year. It seems easy and I may still make it in time…
Maybe I could do this Christmas hats again for one of the parties.
Thanks to my sis-in-law, last night the kids had a free cookie decoration session at her place. I am sure you can guess who made which cookie 🙂
Christmas, to me, is also a time of reflection of what has gone past in a jiffy for the past one year. And very soon, a new year begins with new resolutions and a new beginning!
Merry Christmas everyone, and hope you have a merry time towards the end of 2015 and a great rejuvenating start to 2016!
This is a blog train hosted by Danessa and next up on the blog train is Collin on Daddy Chow.
Collin is a father of one (hoping for more) and blogs at www.daddychow.com. He started the blog about one and a half years ago. His posts mainly revolve around his son (the places they go, the food they eat and also letters to his son). One of his motto in life is to “never give up because the light is always at the end of the tunnel”. He hopes that through the blog, people will have an insight into parenting from a daddy’s perspective and be inspired to be a better parent.
I love your memories, and the traditions and memories you are setting and making with your kids! I love spending time with Mr. T setting up (and taking down) the tree, we put on our Christmas music and make hot chocolate! We also try and take one night during the season just for us, and have dinner, pop some corn and watch a holiday movie. 🙂 With as busy as our lives our, getting that one night is special.
Hot chocolate and music sound good! I must try out that special one night with the family, probably quite different from a date with Mr T only, considering the 3 kids is a big party, but surely we can have a picnic by the tree kind of thing!
oh how fun would that be?!? Love that idea!