Dropping the Ball
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Gingerbread demolition, champagne tossing, and other reader traditions that mark the new year.
We stay up on New Year's Eve to celebrate my twin sisters' birthdays — Nicole was born on December 31 at 11:59 p.m., and Natalie was born two minutes later, in the next year.
We go online to watch (and celebrate!) the new year's arrival around the world.
On New Year's Day we take the kids to a new restaurant, watch a new movie, play a new game, and vote on our new vacation location.
We toss a glass of champagne out the door at midnight on New Year's Eve. (Just the liquid, of course!)
On New Year's Day we write our wishes for the coming year on brightly colored tags and tie them to a tree in our yard. It's beautiful to look out my window and see the paper wishes blowing in the wind.
During the week between Christmas and New Year's, we clean out our closets and send some clothes to the foster mom in Guatemala who cared for our daughter until we adopted her.
We do a polar bear dip on New Year's Day, followed by hot chocolate.
I give each of my eight children their own seed packet, and on them they write what they hope to accomplish in the upcoming year. They plant their seeds on New Year's Day, and when they water them, they look at the packets as a reminder of their goals.
During the year I throw party invitations, 4-H ribbons, newspaper articles, back to school letters, locks of hair, etc., into a box. On New Year's Eve we spend an hour or so looking through the items from the year, then store them in the attic.
On January 1 out come the hammers and the mugs of milk — time for the demolishing (and devouring) of the gingerbread house.
We Want MailPlease tell us: What quirky habits or unusual obsessions does your child have, and how do you indulge her? (For example, you let her wear a tutu to preschool every day, or all he wanted for his birthday was a box of pinecones — and he got it.) E-mail us at familytraditions@wondertime.com.
