Hello everyone! I am so excited to be here today and thanks so much to Andy for inviting me over to his blog! My name is Jay and I run a m/m romance review blog called Joyfully Jay.  In my real life I am a suburban mom of two wonderful girls, ages 10 and 12 1/2.  Yes, we are right on the cusp of having teenagers, and let me tell you, the view is scary from over here!  But they really are fabulous and my husband and I are so lucky to have them in our lives. Andy asked me to share my thoughts about kids and the holidays with you guys.  I love the traditions of the holidays, the …

A PAGAN CHRISTMAS Well, actually it’s called Yule and should really be celebrated on the 21st December, the Winter Solstice. However, I didn’t think it was fair on children to ask them to celebrate their festivities four days early. Children, being the ‘live in the now’ creatures they are, could easily have all their presents on the 21st and still get upset because they don’t have Christmas Presents on the 25th. So, we moved Yule on by a few days. We still celebrate with a ritual on 21st, but so many of the rituals and symbolism have been ‘stolen’ by Christmas it’s really all blurred into one.

Deck the halls with boots of lollies! On this wonderful 6th of December, children (and adults) awake to find the shoe they left out their door overnight full of goodies from Nikolaus. Similar to perhaps how a stocking overhanging a fireplace might be filled, in Germany—where my family and I celebrate Christmas—this happens earlier in the month.

Traditions… then and now One of my favorite traditions has been trimming the tree. *laugh* Okay, yes, it’s a pain getting the tree down from the attic, setting it, and so on. When the kids were young, I’d haul it down a day or so after Thanksgiving. They were off for Thanksgiving break and that Saturday we’d get started on the tree. That was *always* the first thing done. And man, I had boxes of ornaments. Ornaments from the very old, the very expensive… to things made by the kids in school. Our tradition was the kids helped me dress the tree—it was naked when it came from the attic, so it was up to us to dress it. That’s …