Lindsey Unedited: Traditions Galore!

Oh, how I love Christmas this year more than I ever have! I have been incorporating more traditions this year than I ever have before. Traditions are what bring families together and create everlasting memories.They connect us to our culture and also bond us to the generations of family before us who started them and passed them down to us.

Today, I'll highlight a couple of things we have done here at the Rietzsch home and I'll continue to post more throughout the week.

Elf on a Shelf

Winkie the elf

My friends, say hello to Winkie! He is our newest addition to the family - yes, our "elf on the shelf". He arrived on Thanksgiving day on our doorstep. We read the book, assigned him a name and each day like clockwork, he observes the children, flies back to the North Pole when they are sleeping and reports to Santa, then flies back before sunrise and hides in a new spot to spy on them. They love waking up each morning and searching the house for Winkie. The best part is - they have really been extra nice knowing that he is watching them.

Advent Calendars

After they find Winkie, they run to their wooden advent calendars. These were a gift from their Oma a few years ago. Each little wooden drawer is filled with a tasty treat as they count down the days until Christmas.

Gabe's is a train and the girls have Christmas trees

Gingerbread "Toast" People

Now, my amazing creative children came up with this idea on their own. Friday after school they wanted a snack and decided to take gingerbread boy cookie cutters and cut out toast. They then decorated the gingerbread toast people with jam, honey, oats, pretzels and peanut butter. I was so proud of them! They even shared theirs with me.

My German great grandma - Minnie Augusta "Plewe" Lundskog

Lindsey's Stollen

Then, to top off the weekend, I surprised my German hubby with his all-time favorite Christmas desert - stollen! This is something he usually gets mailed to him from his mom. Sometimes he makes a version traditional to where he is from with marzipan and poppy seed filling. But it has been a while and I wanted to make a kind that is popular in Germany - just not the part where he is from. He loved it!

This bread doesn't just have a special place with my husband's family. It turns out that my mom's grandma who was from Germany used to make this all the time and my mom and her mom used to teach classes on how to make this bread way back in the day. I had no idea!

Check out my fabulous recipe! http://cookwithlindsey.blogspot.com/2013/12/lindseys-stollen.html