...in one door and out the other...

 Holidays are rich with tradition.

Beyond the true blessing of the Nativity, some might say that those traditions make the holidays. We look forward, not to the changing of the calendar page, but to the promise of time spent with loved ones and time-honored customs.  We invest our energy and our emotion in preparing... for baking and decorating cookies or stringing lights or caroling or...

We create and continue our family history, by stitching moments in the here and now to memories of years past.  The holidays, by way of tradition, are a gateway to travel through time.

In the early years with my eldest, when I was a single-parent, I prioritized the creation of traditions with him.  Our little family of two needed that solid ground.  He, autistic, needed routine and familiarity.  I, lonely and alone, needed to believe that I could be enough for him.

I poured my creative energy into making special memories and repeating them, year after year.
And while I found satisfaction in the delight that sparkled in his eyes when he'd come downstairs in the morning to discover that day's surprise, he grew to eagerly anticipate each season's traditions.

And so, our imperfect little team of two was a family, perfect and whole and anchored in tradition.

One of those traditions, and likely one you'll recognize and have some version of yourself is the:

 Advent Calendar

Our version has changed, drastically, over the years, but began humbly enough with the store-bought (German sourced, of course! Ha!) chocolate treat.  24 sweets to count the days through Christmas Eve, hidden behind the paper doors of a holiday scene. One per day was awfully hard for my little one.
(One year, in a failed efffort to keep the temptation out of reach, I put it on the windowsill...right above one of the baseboards...and woke up to a chocolate river pouring down the wall!)
And just like that, my new tradition of buying two (just in case but more often than not, one for morning-one for night) was born. 

Gradually over the years, I tried my hand at other variations. Always buying one chocolate calendar for morning excitement, and then trying to create the perfect evening treat as well.

24 candy canes hanging on the staircase wasn't quite exciting enough, so the next year, I made 24 felt cones and hung them off garland on the staircase, filling each with a handful of special chocolates.  While absolutely adorable, that option proved far too tempting to a certain midnight snacker, and the following year the cones hung from the top of our big front window instead.

And then we moved.

And, in moving, said 'farewell' to everything we could unload at a garage sale for extra cash...those felt cones included.  Mind you, they were adorable!

Relocating, and drastically downsizing meant I had to really get creative.  As did my mom-guilt, at an all-time high by now, having ripped my boy away from everything familiar.

So that year, I went with the "spoil him daily" option...little knowing I was creating high expectations for the next few years!

With no interior stair railings to hang treats off of, I went with the next best option...24 little gifts, wrapped in paper from years gone by, for him to pick and choose from every day.

An easy win, that stood the test of time right through the end of middle school.

As time went on, I got out ahead of the rush, and bought "a few of his favorite things" well in advance.

Treats over the years ranged from tiny Transformers to his favorite snacks, and even new books from favorite authors.  And always, always craft supplies and tools to support his then-burgeoning interest in what would become his first business: custom designed 3d printed Transformers!

Then one day, I saw it.

The perfect Advent Calendar!

A darling wooden house, complete with winter woods and village, and 24 tiny little drawers.

Reminiscent of so many beautiful vintage German Christmas decorations I had grown up with.

The perfect holiday inspiration!

I knew exactly what I wanted to do, to create a lasting holiday tradition full of fun! I set to work right away, once again with scrap wrapping paper leftover from other years, and the sweetest candy-cane striped twine.  Teeny tiny scrolls...elfkin clues for a festive treasure hunt!

And he loved it!

As did I!

We had such fun that first year...making a big production of dimming the lights and turning on the Advent House, unrolling the tiny little clue and searching for where the treat had been hidden.

This was it...the one to keep!

With Henri's first Christmas season on the horizon, I searched for another Advent House and lucked out, finding one that fit the bill at T.J. Maxx.  (Since then, I've noticed they carry more and more of them each year!) 

Johannes', of course, remains the tall one as befitting his stature, and Henri has the shorter.

The "resident elf" works twice as hard now, on 1/2 the coffee! (Still nursing.)

And as with everything else when raising two boys 17 years apart, she's tasked with creating two very different advent-ures...one more challenging and abstract, the other far simpler and accessible.

And Henri follows his big brother's lead: choosing to believe in the tiny little elf who leaves tiny little clues, to sweets and treats hidden about our home.

Johannes, for his part, indulges in the fun of it...both for the inevitable treat, and for the magic we're creating for his little brother.

Year 1

Year 2

This year, I decorated early (I know, I know...I never decorate early.  But this year we needed Christmas so much more!) and Henri spent the next several days eagerly and none-too-patiently anticipating the start.  Every day, several times, he'd drag one or the other of us by hand to the houses, chortling and signing his demands to start now!

Magic...he remembered.

Tradition...ours.

***

As you may know, I've also two beloved but long-distance stepchildren.  We continue to make every effort to include them in our traditions, which can be challenging from 8 hours away.  Last year, I was delighted to find a few of these wooden forest advent calendar sets. On the first day, you open the tree...and then each day's door contains a woodland animal to either put in the tree or around it. The final day, of course, contained the tree-topping star.  We sent one to my stepchildren, and kept one each for the boys, so that every day at "generally" the same time, we could all open them together.

This year, I've used the pieces from the set in our holiday decorating, and every time I look up and see them, I think fondly of my stepchildren...just another layer of warm and cozy moments made memory...made history...made tradition.

...in a nutshell...

 There are, as I'm reminded daily, many challenges unique to raising children 17 years apart, particularly when their specific needs are often in conflict with one another.  I find myself torn in two, more often than not, trying to determine which calamity-in-the-works takes priority in the moment.  One son needs my firm guidance and reassuring support.  The other needs energetic response and creativity.  My moments of failure have been frequent and epic, but in the last little while, I've found myself growing into this season of motherhood a bit more gracefully.
A moment's pause...a hand held up in acknowledgement...a cycle of deep breaths in and out...and the shift from one mode to another is becoming streamlined.

I wouldn't have it any other way.

This family is the miracle I thought had already passed me by.

(Though, I'd gladly accept a few extra hours to take the edge off of my ever-growing sleep deficit!)

Now perhaps it's just the holiday-magic at play...and I'm fine with that. 
I needed it this year more than ever before.
The sharing of traditions that I first created for my eldest, while in the throes of single-motherhood, is somehow...restorative.

I've only touched on it in fits and starts here on the blog, but both being an adoptee and having had a marriage that didn't 'succeed' (which meant our family was broken) really motivated me to try to create family traditions.  I was bound and determined to give my eldest son a feeling of family history...fill him so chock-full of our own created customs that he'd never feel the lack of a father or siblings, or of extended family.

I worked hard at it.  Channeling my natural creativity into making celebrations of everyday moments and staying up late setting up treasure hunts and writing lunchnote poems. 
I worked hard at it for years.  And then, high school arrived on scene, and I felt a sense of ending.
Bittersweet.  My traditions no longer needed. His, still to come.
 

And then came Henri.  Not a fresh start, but a natural continuation.  (What a strange way to define a child...ha!)  And family tradition suddenly so much more meaningful as it grew to include Henri and my partner.

Family traditions that I had created out of desperation, while enduring some of my worst moments, now bringing me back to my core...bringing out the best in me.

Relaxing. Reminding.

Restoring.

~~~

All this above, long-winded and rambling as ever, to get to this below...

~~~

One of our favorite holiday traditions has gotten a bit of a remix, since Henri was born.

Crèche in a Walnut

For most of Johannes' school years, he could count on the re-emergence of this little ornament bright and early, on December 1st.  Finding it, wherever I had tucked it away, was the trick...and the treat, a cookie for breakfast on a special holiday plate, made for a frantic hunt every morning.

And years and years of my ever-upping the ante...

trying in vain to find places to hide it... 

that would challenge him...

and chew up enough time...

for me to get breakfast on the table!

Come Henri's first Christmas season, I was running on fumes and the last thing I wanted to add to my plate was baking cookies for that plate. Ha!  So, I sternly talked myself into "outsourcing"...and the result was a win on all fronts.  Instead of fresh-baked cookies, both boys could look forward to their pick of a Lindt Lindor Truffle, from the special bowl, if one or the other (or the darling duo) happened to come across the Crèche in a Walnut in their daily path of destruction. 

Last year I made a bit more a production out of it with a defined time to hunt.

 

This year, I'm taking advantage of my insomniac-schedule and hiding it in the dark...leaving the all-day window for whoever finds it first.  Henri, having spent every day looking for "Chickaletta for Chocaletta"...

(same premise, different stowaway) 

...since last December, is giving Johannes a run for his...chocolate!

Maybe someday, I'll bring it back down to its humble beginnings and prep the cookie batter for early morning baking again, but for now, this one's a win in my book.

And theirs!