Small Town Stitcher: A Holiday Tradition I love (and how I'd really love to win a new mint cleaner!!)

So I was surfing through my favorite blogs today and I found this awesome giveaway on Tatertots and Jello. To enter to win a Mint Cleaner Robotic Floor Cleaner you just have to post on your blog about one of the topics they mentioned...so here is my entry and boy, could I use something to help me keep my kitchen floor clean. Have I ever mentioned how Chris says I would be the perfect wife if only I liked housework a little more. Well, he's exaggerrating on the perfect part, but definitely not on the liking housework part!

So...my family is big on tradition and it's something I'm hoping to pass on to my children. Every year of my life (except for the year my Mom was pregnant with my brother), we have driven to Illinois (an 18-hr drive, mind you) to my grandparents's house to have Christmas with them. And the entire trip has become such a tradition that when Chris and I married, it wasn't even a question. We'd be making the trip ourselves. There was no way I was missing Christmas in Pearl. Now, understand that my Grandparents live in a town so small they have to drive half an hour to get to a town the size of the one I live in and my blog is called Small Town Stitcher. There is absolutely NOTHING to do there EXCEPT spend time with family and make our own fun. But that is why we love it so much.

So, every year, when school lets out we get ready to go. We pack warm clothes and hope for snow. We pack snacks and Christmas movies in the car. We pack our Christmas presents and hide them in suitcases from ~~nosy~~ inquisitive little eyes. We pack extra blankets just in case and we head out. We drive as far as we can go in one day (although many times in my life we've driven through the night to avoid a hotel room), stopping for meals, gas and time for little legs to run. We talk to each other, play games like I Spy, watch (or listen from the front seat) to the Grinch, Polar Express, and an occasional Mary Poppins or Madagascar (whatever was already in the DVD player from before!). We sleep and listen to the radio. When a family is trapped together in a car on the highway, it's the perfect time to catch up on all the talking you forget to do in your everyday lives.

A view of the creek last year in one of those lucky snowy Christmases!

Once we're there, we again hope for snow. We bake. We talk. We read old magazines and Reader's Digests Grandma has saved. We play card games, feed the horses, play pool and hope for snow. We drive to Walmart to get what we've forgotten at home and check on sleds just in case it snows. Are you noticing a theme here? These Florida people WANT some snow! And sometimes (like this last year) we get lucky, althought not often enough!

Emma giving her GG and Granddad some love last year!

But the best part is having four generations of family including cousins, aunts and uncles, all gathered in my Grandparents' living room. We open presents. We laugh. We reminisce. Some wrapping paper fights get started with the balled up paper. We share in traditions that all of us love.
I know that this tradition won't last forever. I know that life is not forever, therefore things have to change. But that makes each Christmas there even more special. I know that I will NEVER forget spending Christmas with my family in Pearl. I hope that my children won't either. Wherever Christmas finds our family in the future, I know the memories of our family tradition will warm my heart and I can only pray it does the same for my children. Maybe one day my grandchildren will LOVE to come and spend Christmas with me like I do with my Grandparents. I can only hope!

I LOVE this picture of my sweet boy!

And now for the obligatory mention that I posted this as an entry to win the Robotic Cleaner. But, please believe this would have been posted anyway. Stories like this are what make the Holidays so special. So, share a story with me...what's your favorite Christmas tradition?

I am participating in Infarrantly Creative and Tatertots and Jello’s Blog Hop for a chance to win a Mint Cleaner. It is the revolutionary machine that cleans your hard floor surfaces for you.

Click here to join the blog hop and a chance to win! Mint_cloth2