It’s worth finding things in life to celebrate, I think.  We have a lot of opportunities to make special moments together as a family, if we just look for them.

For instance, we are not Chinese, but it’s a tradition in our house to celebrate Chinese New Year.  It started when we lived in Vancouver, BC, which has a large Chinese population.  We celebrated with friends there, and it’s been a fun and relatively easy thing we can do as a family ever since.

We don’t believe in any of the superstitions around celebrating the Lunar New Year as the Chinese do, but we find the parts of the celebration that we can participate in and have fun with them.

Chinese Food

© Lynne Furrer | Dreamstime.com

This year, as in many years past, we had a pretty simple meal for Chinese New Year – stir-fried venison and veggies, with rice.  I served it with a red sweet and sour sauce in addition to the kiddos favorite sweet soy sauce.  We’ve had sweet-n-sour chicken, egg rolls, chow mein, egg drop soup, wontons, and many other Chinese dishes on previous New Year’s celebrations.  I know a friend who usually orders Chinese take-out.  We usually try eating with chop-sticks, too, which is entertaining on its own!

Fortune Cookies

Many of our local stores carry packaged Fortune Cookies.  These little treats are always a favorite part of our Chinese New Year meal.  In the past we’ve also made our own Fortune Cookies, using a recipe we found somewhere on the internet, and including Proverbs from the Bible on the tiny papers inside, instead of traditional fortunes.  We always get a good laugh out of the fortunes!

Red, red and more red

I am still not 100% sure of the significance of the color red in the Chinese New Year celebrations, but red is important in all aspects of the festivities.  Red clothes, red envelopes with gifts inside, red lanterns… red, red and more red.  This makes decorating really easy!  We ate our simple dinner on red plastic plates, drank our 7-up and grenadine (making a very red drink) out of red dixie cups, and used the red cloth napkins that usually come out for Christmas and Valentine’s Day too.  If you want to go all out, red streamers and paper lanterns are easy to find at most any Dollar Store and could be added to your decor.  Those Chinese take-out boxes also make for fun decorations!

Fashion Fun

For our Chinese New Year celebration, I have 2 outfits that I usually alternate between.  One is a simple Chinese style black shirt with red and gold oriental fabric on the trim and black cord toggle buttons.  The other is an ornate red and gold suit I had custom-made for me in Indonesia when we were there on Missions in 2005.  The shirt I bought at Value Village years ago for $3, and the suit, even tailored for me, was $35 USD.  I also have a couple of different pairs of funky Chinese-style earrings that I like to wear.  The children always know that it’s a special day when I come out wearing any of these things.

Even if you don’t have a special suit or shirt to wear, anything that is red, gold or black seems to be fitting for the occasion.  While not at all necessary, it’s just fun to wear interesting clothes on special days.  Our kiddos enjoy it!

© Photomorgana | Dreamstime.com

Red Envelopes

There is a tradition on Chinese New Year that money is exchanged in red envelopes.  Once again, there are specifics about this tradition that I am not sure of.  But we’ve shared little gifts with our kiddos in this manner as part of our Chinese New Year celebrations before – things like stickers, coupons for special treats or privileges, small gift cards, or just a hand-made and hand-written card.  It doesn’t have to be much for it to be a special gift, and that can be a fun part of celebrating this day together as a family.

There are many other things that you can incorporate into your Chinese New Year celebrations for your family.  Dragons, animal of the year, Chinese music, and Chinese games can all be included in different ways.  It doesn’t have to be elaborate, but it can be another occasion that you choose to make fun with your family, just because you can!  A simple Chinese New Year celebration can be an excellent opportunity to make great family memories together.

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