What are some of your family traditions?

I was trying to think, there MUST be some family 'traditions'... but Curries never were ones for always doing things the same way just because that's the way it was done....and any advice was very practical and based on whether it worked. So I looked up the meaning of 'tradition' - 'the handing down of information, beliefs, and customs by word of mouth or by example from one generation to another without written instruction'....hmmm.........I do remember my grandfather saying that potatoes should always be planted in line with the Parish Church and the War Memorial....that was in Alyth... but it is good advice as that was due north /south.......' Never swim on an out going tide'....... that was pretty good advice too.

Kids, of course, had their own 'rules: 'If you step on the cracks in the sidewalk. you'll break your grandmother's dishes." "If you break a mirror you'll have seven years bad luck......." "if you pick dandelions, you'll wet the bed" "Walking under a ladder brings bad luck" The customs that were different were based in our Scottish roots. Christmas was celebrated for the children with Christmas stockings but was not as big a family occasion as Hogmanay, or New Year, with the many rituals that ensured good fortune for the coming year.

'First footing' was important and meant that the first person to cross your doorstep after midnight into the New Year had to be a dark haired man who had to carry a lump of coal, which meant that there would be prosperity in the house in the coming year and that it would always be warm. Houses were always cleaned and sparkling before the new year. I still get a wierd, primitive urge to make sure my house is cleaned before December 31st.! Halloween was a big night in Scotland and as children we dressed up and went out 'guising' around the neighbours, where we had to perform a 'party piece', usually a poem or a song, before being given an apple or a baked treat.

We carried lanterns, made out of turnips, known as 'neeps' in Scotland (swedes) with carved faces. I still remember how tough it was to get all the centre out when you were making it.......and then the warm, sweet smell of a turnip lantern with a candle in it. There was usually a party after you had been out guising, with 'dooking' for apples in a big tin bath - trying to catch a floating apple without using your hands - you had to use your teeth, lots of spluttering and wet hair!

Then there was something about trying to get a bite out of a scone which was dangling on a string and covered with treacle, with your hands tied behind your back. I'm not quite sure what that was all about, except that you got incredibly sticky! There was also 'Murder in the dark' where an adult ( usually) told a tale which included scary things like bones, and brains and eyeballs - while things which usually had some awful texture, I remember liver for one - were passed around to be felt in the dark.

Halloween in Scotland was celebrated like this long before it became de rigeur in England, whose preference used to be to celebrate 'Guy Fawkes Night' on November 5th, with a huge bonfire, usually on some common ground, and fireworks. It was always good to roast potatoes in the hot embers of the fire and warm your gloved November-cold hands on them when they came out of the fire. As we moved to England when I was nearly six, we had the benefit of both 'cultures'.

I don't know whether expressions that were used count as 'traditions', but some of the Scottish ones I recall are quite picturesque... 'a shoemaker's weans are aye the worst shod'......... (weans = children: aye = always).... I think this means that we tend to look after others before we look after ourselves.

'fools and bairns shouldn't see half finished work'.... ( bairns = another word for children) means, don't critique someone else's work before it's completed. There will probably be more expressions that come to me........