I watched a show this past Sunday that focused on the value that traditions have to our families. Professor William Doherty (director of marriage and family therapy at the University of Minnesota) shared four reasons why our traditions are so important:
1. Family traditions help make family life predictable. In a world where life is often unpredictable having a family ritual helps make life more secure for both parents and children.
2. Creating new family traditions gives families a chance to reconnect and share their lives. Traditions cultivate connections between immediate family members and between generations.
3. A family identity is formed through rituals. By establishing family traditions & rituals we give children an identity, a group to belong to, and a sense of who they are.
4. Family rituals teach children values. Children learn what their parents value by the rituals that are observed such as attending church, giving service, and visiting elderly relatives. Rituals give children a set of values that they can take into adulthood and use in their own families.
Family traditions are the "we always" of family life. For example, "we always go out to lunch on the last day of school," "We always go to Cox Farms every fall." Traditions are meaningful time spent together as a family.
The show focused not only on yearly traditions, but weekly ones as well (attending church together, etc.). An idea I am going to try and incorporate is taking a family walk on Sundays. It is the one day of the week I know we all will be together - cheap, fun, easy - LOVE IT!
OUR FALL TRADITIONS:
The pictures above are from our yearly Cox Farms trip. We surprised the kids by taking them yesterday. In addition to Cox farms we have a couple of fall traditions - Friday Night Fright Flicks, Trunk or Treat at the church and trick or treating, baking Halloween cookies and pumpkin bread, and of course Halloween parties.
I would LOVE to hear your family's fall traditions. Please share!
Cox Farms - October 2008
Creating meaningful family traditions is what is working for me this week. For more fun tips, visit Works for me Wednesday hosted by Shannon at Rocks in my Dryer.
