San Francisco Dad

The Advent of Traditions

Back when SFDad was growing up, he had always wanted^† a Christmas advent calendar. The kids of our Christian next-door neighbors got one every year, and SFDad always looked longingly at their chocolate-a-day treats whenever he went over to visit.

So, when SFDad spotted a $0.99 advent calendar at Trader Joe’s a few weeks ago, he could hardly refuse the chance to provide this tasty experience for SFBaby.

As you might guess, the advent calendar was a hit, but enforcing the “one chocolate a day” rule has been hard. It doesn’t help that we sometimes miss days and need to “make up” for them later, which muddies the water significantly. At this point, we have to actually hide the calendar outside of the meal area so as not to distract SFBaby from her normal food.

^† After discussing with SFGrandma, it seems that SFDad did actually get advent calendars during some years of his youth—he had just forgotten about it. But that doesn’t make for as good of a story.

Tags: advent calendar, christmas, trader joe's, traditions

One Comment

• friendly neighbor to the north says:

  December 15 2009 at 11:46 am

  I think I know what we’ll be mailing to you next year…

  Reply