Tasty Traditions we can’t live without at Christmas!

Hello, hello!

Happy Christmas Eve Eve! 🙂

Can you believe Christmas is seriously only 2 days away?

Will you be tracking Santa this year?

Gosh, the internet is such a wonderful thing! Remember when we were kids and we just had to cross our fingers and hope that Santa was going to make it around the world in time, wondering where he was right at that very moment, trying to stay awake so we could hear the reindeer land on the roof?

We hoped our carefully handwritten letters were mailed on time, that the Santa in the mall remembered to pass along our whispered Christmas wishes to the elves, and boy, oh boy, what were we going to do now that we’ve moved into a house with no chimney!

Now, we can email Santa and track his every movement. Nope, that’s not creepy at all. 🙂

Do you bake cookies for Santa?

We never really did that – probably because the dogs would have eaten the cookies before Santa showed up, anyway.

Anyhoo, in honor of it being Tasty Tuesday (you almost forgot, didn’t you?!),

I thought I would share some of our Tasty Christmas Traditions.

Christmas Eve Dinner

We always go out for breakfast for dinner.

source

We’ve been doing that since Thing 2 was a tiny little Thing. It’s so fun! It’s nice and relaxing and easy. Our challenge, because we were always moving, was finding the place that both served breakfast all day and stayed open on Christmas Eve. Thanks to the internet, that’s so much easier these days. 🙂  Then, we go and check out the Christmas lights. 🙂

Christmas Morning

I don’t remember when it started but for many, many years now, I make these muffins on Christmas morning.

source

They are the Cinnamon Cobblestone Crunch Muffins from The Pampered Chef®.

I typically pre-prep the cinnamon pecan mixture the night before and get up early and get them in the oven. We eat them warm, drink OJ or mimosas and coffee (adults only!) and take our time getting to the presents. The Things didn’t enjoy the waiting so much when they were little but, after a few years, they saw how fun it was to just hang out as a family before the madness started. 🙂

Mimosas!

source

Need I say more?

Christmas Dinner

For Christmas dinner, we either do a ham or a turkey (depends on what happened at Thanksgiving) but either way, they’re ALWAYS cooked on the grill.

source

When I was growing up, I didn’t like turkey. Strange, right? Well, I didn’t. So, my mom always had a ham slice for me. Then, one year, my dad grilled the turkey.

Holy. Moly.

I was hooked and it became a thing that always had to happen. I’ve never once cooked a turkey in the oven. I don’t care if there’s a blizzard outside, if we’re having turkey, we’re grilling it. Om. Nom. Nom.

Talk to me: Do you have any tasty Christmas traditions? What are you most looking forward to?

– jennifer