Christmas Traditions: Baking cakes and delivering them to family and friends on Christmas Eve, making home made cookies, eating Christmas Eve dinner at Grandma’s, hanging our stockings, and watching A Christmas Story.

A large part of our family’s holiday is centered around food. My mother explained that cooking and baking with the family has always been a huge part of our family, going back to our ancestors who emigrated from Germany in the 1800s to the U.S. and became owners of a farm, a farm that our extended family still has. That is why we would always go over to our grandmother’s house for a proper Christmas Eve dinner. My family has emphasized generosity and hospitality during the Christmas season. We would bake cakes and cookies with our mother and grandmother. My sisters and I would then deliver these cakes to friends and family as a way of saying “we are thinking about you this holiday season.” This recalls an old time American, Midwest tradition for me, of cooking for people you care about. We would also always hang our stockings together which were all crossed stitched by my mother when we were young. The images on these stockings are also old time American, recalling paintings of Norman Rockwell. My dad grew up in the 1950’s and 60’s and one of his favorite movies is A Christmas Story. We always watch that movie with him on Christmas Eve which also brings to mind the old, simple, all American life for me.