I always have a hard time picking a favorite holiday because I like Advent best and that technically isn’t a holiday. My family has a lot of special things we do during advent. Each night (or as many as we can do based on our schedules) we light the appropriate number of candles on the Advent wreath (1 during the first week, 2 during the second week, and so on) and do a devotional. On the first day of December, we start reading The Twenty-Four Days Before Christmas by Madeleine L' Engle. The book spans the twenty-four days before Christmas so we read a section each day. For example on the first, we read about what the family did on the first. We also have a Christmas trivia book that my sister reads from and the rest of us try to answer the question. We put our Christmas tree up right after Thanksgiving (it is an artificial tree) and we try to sing one Christmas song a night around it. (Although as schedules got busier and my sister got farther in her musical studies, we don’t do this as much. My dad is not a good singer at all and although I’m better than he is, I’m not good either.
) I love baking Christmas cookies, but we can’t (or rather shouldn’t 
) eat all of the cookies I bake so I send a lot of them to relatives and friends of the family. Each day starting soon after Thanksgiving, my sister and I put up one Christmas decoration each. That way we gradually decorate our house as it gets closer to Christmas. This year however we are going to put up two decorations a day each and my mom is going to help (Our collection of decorations has grown since we started this tradition and in past years we’ve ended up putting a lot of decorations up last minute). On Christmas Eve we have lasagna for dinner (Stouffers because it is convenient and we have a lot to do on Christmas Eve). We go to church for the “midnight” candlelight service (it is either at 10 or 11). Before church we watch a Christmas movie and my sister and I open one present each. Since I like to snoop under the tree, my family likes to try to play tricks on me. One year they wrapped all of my presents in shoeboxes and another year they put jingle bells in all of my presents. On Christmas day, we have breakfast as a family and take turns opening presents. We have a paper bag set up for the wrapping paper, and we try to make baskets. Since my aim, in particular, isn’t very good, we also spend a lot of time laughing over where the wrapping paper lands. Sometimes we go to church (one year we went and the pastor gave a 20 minute sermon about the town of Bethlehem, which was not exactly the kind of sermon we wanted on Christmas so we don’t go if he is the one who is preaching 
). If we didn’t have time to finish unwrapping presents before church, we finish afterwards. For Christmas dinner we have ham, corn, scalloped potatoes, favorite rice (really Uncle Ben's Broccoli Rice Au Gratin), rolls that we bake in the shape of a Christmas tree, and cake for dessert.
)
. There's usually wii games going on, or table tennis, or pc games. Then on Dec. 26th we have a just-family celebration with presents in the morning and cinnamon rolls. In the evening we open the small presents in our christmas socks. 
Phew! Dodged a bullet there, eh? My dad is impossible to shop for...if you get him something he can't use it goes into the mythical "Pile of Christmas Gifts Past" in the closet. It's a pretty huge stack! 
) but it'll be really cool 
