Tag Archives: family customs

Feeding Birthday Cake

AGE: 21

DATE OF PERFORMANCE: 4/19

LANGUAGE: English 

NATIONALITY: Canadian 

OCCUPATION: Student 

PRIMARY LANGUAGE: English 

RESIDENCE: Westlake Village 

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Interviewer: What’s a tradition you and your family have done during the holidays or certain celebrations?

SA: “One small but meaningful tradition in my family happens during birthdays. I only recently learned that this is an Indian thing–but the person whose birthday it is feeds cake to the people closest to them, and they get fed cake by those same people. It’s a simple act but deeply rooted in affection and closeness.”

Interpretation

A lot of the rituals, superstitions, and other traditions that SA had described to me in her family and her culture surround concepts of love, devotion, and affection. I think it’s so beautiful that there are so many distinct rituals that surround the concept of love and adoration. The only rituals or traditions I can think of at the moment in American society is either Valentine’s Day or someone’s anniversary. But on the topic of birthday rituals, in Korean culture it’s typical that the person’s family will make them birthday soup. The next chance I get to interview SA, I would love her to expand on how she found out it was an Indian tradition and whether she would like to continue this tradition with her family in the future. Since it involves cake, did this tradition begin as the modern world developed or has cake replaced something else used in the past? Either way, what a beautiful and familial tradition.

Green Toilet Water & Leprechaun Traps: A St. Patrick’s Day Home Ritual

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Every St. Patrick’s Day, my informant’s family embraced a quirky tradition that transformed their house into a playful leprechaun hideout. When he was a child, he would wake up to find all the toilet water in the house dyed bright green. Sometimes the milk in the fridge was green too. The explanation? “The leprechauns must have peed in the toilet!” his parents told him, turning what might seem odd or gross into a magical sign of leprechaun mischief.

Beyond the household pranks, his school also took part in the fun. In elementary school, he and his classmates were encouraged to build “leprechaun traps,” small craft projects designed to catch the elusive creatures and, hopefully, earn a share of their gold. He remembers one trap in particular: “I painted it green, gave it a rainbow, and included a miniature pot of gold filled with plastic coins.” The traps were never successful–leprechauns, after all, are notoriously tricky–but they added to the sense of enchantment that surrounded the holiday each year.

Context
My informant recalled these traditions as part of his early childhood, especially between the ages of 5 and 9. He explained that the green toilet water and milk were surprises that would appear the morning of March 17th–small, imaginative gestures from his parents meant to keep the magic of the holiday alive. Though the tradition wasn’t linked to any religious or cultural identity in his household, it functioned as an annual burst of fun, one that made St. Patrick’s Day feel special even without a major family gathering or party.

At school, the leprechaun traps were an institutionalized form of holiday play, guided by teachers who framed it as a creative art activity. While the traps themselves were never functional, the idea that something magical might have visited the classroom overnight added an element of suspense and wonder. Though my informant no longer celebrates the holiday in the same way, these memories stood out as defining childhood moments–both silly and strangely memorable.

Analysis
This home custom illustrates how American families often adapt holidays like St. Patrick’s Day into playful, child-centered rituals that rely heavily on imagination, mischief, and material transformation. Though St. Patrick’s Day is originally rooted in Irish Catholic tradition, its contemporary celebration in the U.S.–particularly among non-Irish families–often takes the form of secular, creative play.

The dyed toilet water and milk represent a kind of “domesticated folklore,” where parents intentionally alter everyday environments to encourage a suspension of disbelief. The joke that “leprechauns have green pee” serves both as an explanation and a storytelling device, keeping the legend alive in absurd, humorous form. This aligns with broader traditions of holiday trickery, such as the Tooth Fairy leaving glitter or Santa eating cookies–actions that bridge folklore with parental performance.

The leprechaun traps, meanwhile, connect to a form of children’s ritualized play that blends belief with craft. These projects teach children to imagine, to hope for magical outcomes, and to participate in a shared cultural game–even if they know the payoff is imaginary. In this way, the practice reinforces values like creativity, humor, and seasonal anticipation, all while fostering a sense of community through parallel rituals at home and school.

Ultimately, this custom demonstrates that even informal, low-stakes traditions can hold deep folkloric meaning. They reflect how modern families re-enchant the everyday, turning plumbing and plastic coins into touchpoints for wonder, bonding, and shared memory.

Christmas Crowns, Cracker Jokes, and “Reindeer Poop”

Word of Mouth From my Mother

If you didn’t notice son, Christmas is a carefully choreographed tradition–I like to think of it as a mix of cozy ritual, a bit of British custom, and some parental magic. Every year, we manage to host your aunts, uncles, grandparents, and family friends under one roof, crowding them around a long dinner table for a meal that never changes: your father’s signature roast, buttery potatoes, and whatever else[she talked about as these dishes seeming to appear out of nowhere but feeling like they’ve always belonged]…

…You remember the main custom, before the meal begins, we all pop Christmas crackers, wear the paper crowns, and tell the corny jokes or trivia questions. Everyone has to wear their crown, no exceptions. [Something of a silent rule.] Inevitably, [Uncle name] brings the energy to the meal as he tries to guess the answer to someone else’s riddle before they finish reading it. It’s chaotic, silly, and comforting–exactly how it’s supposed to be…

…Remember on Christmas eve, we’d leave out a plate of cookies and a glass of milk for Santa, and you and your sister would go to bed, your father and I would leave out a few wrinkled dates in the front yard as “reindeer poop.” We’d also make sure that before Every Christmas morning, no matter how old you two[me and my sister] got, the milk would be half-drunk, the cookies nibbled, and the dates scattered. Even now, when you all know the “truth,” we still put the plate and dates out. It’s tradition…

Context

I interviewed my mom about our family’s Christmas rituals, and she lit up almost immediately. “It’s the one time of year when everyone is just… there,” she said. For her, Christmas was always about creating a sense of continuity–blending traditions from her own childhood with the new ones she and my dad created when we were young. The paper crowns and Christmas crackers come from my dad’s British side of the family, and they’ve been part of every holiday she can remember. “You can’t not wear the crown. It’s just part of the meal,” she joked.

She described how she and my dad would take turns arranging the Santa plate late at night–taking a careful bite of the cookies, sipping the milk just right, and tossing a few dates in the yard to complete the illusion.

These rituals weren’t grand or showy, but they were performed with deep consistency. Even now, with the kids grown, my parents still go through the motions–not because we believe, but because we remember.

Analysis

This Christmas tradition is an excellent example of domestic folklore: habitual, symbolic acts carried out within the family to affirm identity, belonging, and memory. While none of the individual actions–crackers, roast, Santa plates–are unique on their own, the specific combination of these elements, repeated year after year, becomes a form of narrative performance that binds the family together.

The Christmas crackers and paper crowns reflect a cultural carryover from British holiday customs, adapted into the family’s American context. They serve as both props and prompts–each one delivering not just a joke but a shared experience. The insistence on everyone wearing the crowns transforms a simple object into a badge of belonging, and the ritualized groaning at jokes adds a performative dimension to the meal.

The Santa cookies and “reindeer poop” represent another key aspect of holiday folklore: magical realism within childhood belief systems. These actions deliberately blur the line between fiction and reality, giving children something to believe in while also offering parents a way to perform care and wonder. Even as belief fades, the actions remain–now functioning not as proof of Santa, but as proof of love and continuity.

In this sense, the tradition has matured alongside the family: once a tool of imagination, it now functions as a nostalgic ritual that reaffirms connection across time. The ongoing performance of the Santa plate–even when no one is fooled–embodies the essence of folklore: shared meaning enacted again and again, not because we need to believe, but because we want to remember. It’s part of the ties that bind our family together and I will definitely continue this tradition–if not add onto it–with my own kids when the time comes.