Favorite Holiday Rituals

If you know me, you know that I love to create festive traditions for my family VERY often.It’s the little celebrations and rituals that creates a safe space to love, grow, reflect and show gratitude. Creating celebrations and family rituals with my family helps us to strengthen the identity within the family.

There are rites-of-passage rituals, weekly rituals, monthly rituals, birthday rituals and even  DAILY rituals! Okay, okay. I know your probably thinking that’s just a bit too much. The truth is, you create rituals too. Every day, you create rituals for yourself and your family without knowing it. I choose to create loving and lasting memories for the family by being intentional of actions. Tiny celebrations of self and family bring a since of uniqueness in dealing with loss, trauma, happy moments, events, and more.

This season of love and light is no different in my duty of organizing fun, celebrations for this month of a very special birthday, winter solstice, kwanzaa and the ending of the year.

The Favorite family winter solstice is what I would like to share with you all. Winter solstice falls on the day of December 21^st and represents a day to observe for various traditions and customs. Because winter solstice falls on the birthday of a very important man in my life (my husband), our winter observation happens on the 25^th of December! We have been doing this celebration for 6 years and this year, nothing has changed.  There is an excerpt by Women’s Health that explains the stance of winter solstice perfectly:

“ The winter solstice has carried strong symbolism for many, many years. Some refer to solstice as the rebirth of the sun—and not coincidentally Christmas celebrates the birth of the Son. Solstice can be a magical, contemplative time—a night of spiritual re-connection and ritual.”

Winter solstice is our time to celebrate renewal, rebirth and gratitude.

1. I love doing seasonal activities with the children in preparation for our winter solstice celebration. This usually includes an “advent” calendar of some sort. This year, our advent calendar is made from wood and branches decorated with white beads. I like to look at this as a seasonal gift of nature. Soon, we will be doing crafts with holly, fir, mistletoe and pine cones, if we can find them.
2. Listening to jazz music through this season is one I treasure. My jazz holiday starts at December 1^st with a whole concert of music in my head for the season. It’s the best music to clean to as well.
3. This next one is special for me and our extended family members. We have a cookie exchange! Yes, an actual cookie exchange but the catch is, its all through the mail. A week before Christmas,the children and I get our cookies ready to send to the grandparents. At the same time, we record our baking experience and send It to them in a video message. They do the same for us. They love that special treat. The cookies always arrive on the same day our cookies are expected to arrive to the grandparents. Chocolate chip cookies, ginger cookies and sugar cookies for the children to decorate. We package it in decorated jars and enjoy the idea of making them smile.
4. The biggest part of the season is my baking from scratch. I love being creative in the kitchen. Food is an important part to our winter solstice celebration as we have a dinner that same day, filled with foods from the season.
5. The important message of the season is giving back. December is the time I donate the most. Clothing, jackets, toys and decorations are sent to our local shelter for those to feel the  goodness of this winter solstice time.
6. There is no one specific way to celebrate the winter solstice time. For our family, the solstice time is a time of turning inward in meditation, stillness, peace and family. We love to have a festive time but the night before our winter solstice celebration, we meditate together and reflect on what has been and what will be the new year.
7. It’s our time to slow down. The night of our solstice celebration, we meditate in our living room of lit candles.  
8. Most importantly, my husband and I write a list of things we want to release going into the new year, on a piece of paper. We go outside together and burn our list in a fire to symbolize our commitment of release. Be sure to start your list with ‘ I release…’

How do you spend your season? What rituals do you create for your family to engage in? I would love to hear.

In future posts, I will share other rituals that our family does together. In the mean time, click here to find out how you can incorporate rituals for you and your family. You don't have to have a large family to incorporate rituals. You don't have to have a family at all. Rituals are a way to incorporate sense of self into your daily life. Try it! 

All images included in this post are from Google Images.