Samsie:
As an old-timer I add my welcome to you.
You know there was a time when Witnesses celebrated Christmas but in a move to differentiate themselves from “the world” it became a no-no.
Still I can recall my own young years growing up in a Witness family celebrating Christmas up until my high school years.
Like you say, there are happy childhood memories of those family occasions. Let’s face it, it was a joyful time, it was fun!
As others have commented, why not celebrate your children’s birthdays? Those days are an important ‘right of passage’, a recognition of their taking their place in the world, of celebrating how well they are growing into people who have a destiny. The Witnesses cannot point to a scriptural prohibition of birthday celebrations, or Christmas for that matter. They simply parrot the line that bad things happened on birthday celebrations in the Bible. In other words, they are adding “man-made” words to the Bible.
How does your husband feel about all this? That will determine just how much celebrating you do. Even so, I’d suggest you take things a bit at a time, gradually accustomising yourselves to a change in lifestyle.
For myself, I’m very involved in a church these days but when Christmas time comes around I choose not to have a lot of the traditional decorations, but concentrate on what christmas actually means, Christ coming into our world. Different families at church celebrate christmas in different ways, there’s no rules, that’s the important thing.
So, enjoy it!
And again, Welcome aboard!
Cheers,
Ozzie🍷