2018 Butler's Family Valentine's Dinner

A big motivation behind our decision to homeschool is to strengthen and protect our family dynamic in order to set our kids up with the best tools for the future.  Whether we pursue it or not, our family unit will shape the future behaviors and relationship patterns of our kids.  One way we love to feed the family dynamic is holiday traditions!  

Valentine’s Day can be a tricky one because of how conditioned we have become to see it as a couple’s holiday.  Sure kids have school parties, but usually society either loves or hates it based on whether or not you have a date.  And while I love having a Valentine’s date with Mr. Butler, showing love and appreciation should never be limited to a couple. 

This was the year the kids thought I meant costumes when I said "Dress up" so we went with it!

 

Our first or second Valentine’s Day after my oldest was born, a traditional kid-free date night wasn’t going to happen so I decided to improvise.  Instead, we had a fancy dinner at home with nice dishes and our Sunday best.  As we added kids, we just continued the tradition and now it is one of the kids’ favorite nights!   Here are some shots from this year's dinner - complete with lasagna, fresh flowers and Knudson's Sparkling Cherry Juice!

Sometimes you do things out of necessity that later on turn into something so important.  This is one of those things for our family.  It takes extra effort (mostly on my part in regards to cooking and grocery shopping), but the impact this kind of thing has on the kids is huge.  Miss Z has been on a big kick of wanting us to be twins and when we both dressed in black she just about lost it with joy.  Plus, this was the first year we let them use the fancy glasses with Mr. Butler and I.  Fun all around, we talked about what we loved about each other and we worked on our table manners as well! A very good day!

Family Traditions

One of the joys of my life has always been some of our family traditions.  Usually connected to holidays somehow, there are  times of year and particular milestones that dually bring about fond memories of the past and childlike excitement for future events.  Whether you 'celebrate' particular holidays or not, I'm sure you know what I'm talking about. Everything from birthdays to christmas and including that random thing your family always did/does even though you're not sure why.

Neighborhood walks with the dogs - a small pleasure

After getting married, Randy and I have had more than one conversation where we look at each other in disbelief, only to qualify it by saying, "It's not (enter a holiday or event) without (enter a specific tradition)! For example, I come from a large family.  Thanksgiving dinner rarely consists of less than 25 people at least and more towards the 50 range, depending on which side we're talking about.  It doesn't feel like Thanksgiving unless there's a little bit of commotion and random conversations going on in every corner.  As opposites attracting usually creates, Randy's Thanksgiving traditions consist of 10 people or less (at least in my short years with him), and a much slower pace throughout the day.

Showers of food, fun and gifts for the arrival of a new child

Why do I bring this up?  First of all, I think its fun to compare those things in life that just seem solid and automatic, as though there's no other way in the world to do it. As kids, don't we assume that about a lot of things?  Anyway, this is also on my mind because I'm about to start my own family with the addition of a baby Butler and that requires the melding of two childhoods and histories, traditions and all.  No matter what you choose to honor, celebrate or acknowledge as a parent, children grow up with traditions.  I have a strong desire to ensure my kids have really positive and meaningful traditions in their life and I'm looking for some really fun, yet uncommon ideas.  Of course, halloween, thanksgiving, christmas, valentines, easter, etc. have been highlighted in our society, but there's a lot more to living and life than these, as we all know.  There are traditions for the start of a sport season, broken hearts, successes, anniversaries, etc.  Your family is unique and as such your traditions will be as well.  BUT, anybody have any fun/fond traditions that they either had as a kid or have started with your own?

Cedar Creek Camp - a lifetime tradition