<p>Wondering which traditions this group follows on the first day of the new year. </p>
<p>Maintaining the traditions of my youth, I always prepare black-eyed peas. Sometimes it’s Texas caviar, but this year I made a big pot of peas with a ham hock. It’s a bit like soup. Also made a skillet of cornbread to sop up the juice (aka: pot liquor!). The peas were simmering most of the morning and made the house smell wonderful! My mom used to make those little sausage balls for New Years, too. You know them, I’m sure–Bisquick, cheese and spicy sausage…</p>
<p>Whatever your traditions (or not!) here’s to a happy, healthy and peaceful 2013!</p>
<p>When our kids were little, we started a tradition of “First Day Brunch” to which we invited other young families. At the brunch we did all of the decorations and celebration of the new year, but without the dress up clothes or the hassle of finding a NY Eve babysitter. Instead of straight champagne, we served strong mimosas and Bloody Marys. For awhile, it was an annual event. Now it is just occasional, resurrected depending on who may be around, but still lots of fun. (This year and in '09 we postponed First Day and had/are having a big Inauguration Day Brunch instead.)</p>
<p>Our NY day traditions are not such fun or food related but traditions just the same I guess.</p>
<p>We all clear out our Christmas gifts from below the fake-will-stay-up-till-valentine’s day tree and find homes for them.</p>
<p>We still keep an old fashioned paper ‘week at a glance’ datebook for the entire family.
I get to enter all the new year’s appts already scheduled (ie doc,dentist, etc) and each person’s activities, vacations, work trips, etc.
It is the only way that anyone can tell for sure what’s going on a particular day or where someone is. Of course, we each have a paper or phone calendar as well…
Just finished setting up 2013, now off the enjoy my Kindle!</p>
<p>We do blackeyed peas when I’m with my Florida born sil. We have Japanese auspicious food when we are with my other sil whose Mom is Japanese born. We are nearly always with one or the other, and sometimes both.</p>
<p>I started doing a huge formal dinner with the kids and a couple of our friends when the kids were young so they could learn to sit through an adult dinner and use correct utensils. Appetizers, soup, salad, sherbet pallet cleanser, dinner and dessert. It always has pork roast, mashed potatoes and sauerkraut as the center, lots of other items too. It’s the last hurrah before diet It goes for about 3-4 hours and as they got older they lasted through more courses without having to be excused to go play for a while. Good silver, crystal, china were added to their settings as they matured to each level. Now all are adults but it is still an enjoyable end to the holiday season.</p>
<p>I love New Years Day, because it’s lazy and low-stress. The houseguests are gone, there’s nothing left I need to get ready for, and there’s nothing to do.</p>
<p>We have Bisquick coffee cake (quick and easy) while we watch the Rose Parade. A bit of puttering in the kitchen, and then I spend the afternoon reading and/or napping. We graze all day on snack-y things – the Chex Mix I made the night before, veggies w/my special clam dip, Parmesan Bites, the rest of DH’s Harry & David pears that he gets every year for Christmas. Bowl games are the day’s soundtrack. Ahhhhhh!!!</p>
<p>We spend all day in front of the tv watching the Mummers’ Parade in Philadelphia. Sometimes switch to see sunny California and the Rose Parade but mostly it’s the Mummers.</p>
<p>In the Scottish traditions followed when I was young, New Years was a bigger deal than Christmas. We always prepared a formal meal. I always remember the year we roasted a goose, stuffed with sauerkraut. One of the better meals in memory. </p>
<p>The day always feels a little empty compared to the lush traditions years ago. But as I work every other year, just having the day off to clean and organize is luxury enough.</p>
<p>New Years Day is low key, but still very important in our family. We go to my Mom’s for the staples - black eyed peas, cabbage and cornbread, and this year the complements were ham and taco soup.</p>
<p>It’s not a formal meal, just a casual family thing.</p>
<p>At my Pennsylvania relatives home it is always a roast pork with sauerkraut on top for New Years Day. Growing up in NYC my parents always got herring salad for New Years Day. That is when NYC deli’ s would offer it.</p>
<p>Always take a walk on the beach. When the kids were young, we’d drive from our home in NJ to Sandy Hook (the National Park on the northern tip of the Jersey shore which is now badly damaged by hurricane Sandy, not the tragic school of the same name) no matter how cold it was, and then have dinner in the local diner near where H and I grew up.</p>
<p>More recently, H and I take a walk on the Delaware Bay, but same idea. And my D continues the beach tradition by particpating in the Asbury Park polar bear swim.</p>
<p>Garland, I grew up on Staten Island. We regularly went to Sandy Hook. That was the closest nice beach. I immediately thought the tragic school shooting was in NJ when I heard Sandy Hook. Doesn’t matter where it was, it was obviousley very tragic.</p>
<p>But I do have happy memories of Sandy Hook, NJ.</p>
<p>We have to have black-eyed peas, but our family always eats Hoppin’ John…rice and black-eyed peas with bacon, onion and Cajun hot sauce. I have to watch that I don’t make too much because the bacon and white rice aren’t what I want left over after New Year’s.</p>
<p>Wake up late, watch the Rose Parade, cook, relax, visit with friends, have a dinner timed with half-time, watch football, eat one last cookie or cupcake, make plans to start over on Couch2-5K tomorrow…I love New Year’s!</p>
It goes for about 3-4 hours and as they got older they lasted through more courses without having to be excused to go play for a while. Good silver, crystal, china were added to their settings as they matured to each level. Now all are adults but it is still an enjoyable end to the holiday season.</p>