Traditions have always seemed somewhat like a noose to me if I’m honest.
My daddy was a pharmacist at the hospital, so he worked crazy random hours. Because of that, we just didn’t really have traditions. I watched other people roll their eyes at family expectations, so I was totally fine being a random, free spirit when we started our family.
Until....
One summer when Asher was pretty young and we were at the beach, Mr. Early Riser caught me sneaking out to grab a coffee and have an early morning alone at the beach. I told him to jump in and go with me. Footie jammies and all. He felt like he had won the lottery. We drank our coffee/milk and just chatted about the ocean and the animals. We pondered the waves and why God choose to cause them to stop where they do. It was just magical. He told me the next time we were at the beach, he was going to make sure he woke up early every day so he could do that again. 😂.
On the drive home, Brad and I re-evaluated if the kids would need or enjoy traditions. We decided to start looking for little things that we could do as a family, but agreed to never ever let them become a burden. If we outgrew them, let them go. Make new ways. That was a lifestyle I can agree with completely. Quality experience with a loose grip. Sold.
Then we sat awkwardly. Soooo....what exactly did we want to start, other than early morning Starbucks beach time?
I don’t remember when Brad came to me with a twinkle in his eyes. I think it was a normal Thursday. But I saw that he had cooked up something I wanted to sit down and experience.
“I’ve got it. I’ve figured out our family tradition. I don’t think we will ever out grow it—well to be fair, we may literally outgrow it but we won’t get sad about it”. 😂😂.
What if....
See the thing you need to know, is that we were super strict parents to littles. We were pretty hard core on their diet and screen time. I realize this flies in the face of our free spirit parenting philosophy. But it really doesn’t. We just wanted to raise all-around healthy kids. So they rarely ate sugar.
What if...he began...the first Saturday after school ends, we declare “Sugar Saturday”. There are literally zero no’s on Sugar Saturday. We start with breakfast and go until we can’t anymore.
And with that, the greatest day of the year was born. We look forward to it all year. It’s the most wonderful way to celebrate kids who work so hard in school, and it rolls us perfectly into summer. (Cause we ate so much sugar and all... 😉) 
