Whether it's midnight Mass followed by a special late-night snack with the folks, the day-after-Thanksgiving outing to find - and chop down - the perfect Christmas tree, or an overnight at grandma's so the whole gang's together in the morning to open the packages from Santa, the holidays are full of traditions and memories we all hold close to our hearts.
What better day to share favorite stories than Christmas Day.
The Times asked local leaders to share their stories with us.
Enjoy. And perhaps pick up an idea or two for a new holiday tradition.
Eldon Strong, Center Township trustee
"I take a little time to myself and think about Christmases (I had) as a child," Strong said. "I grew up out in the country in Winfield. I remember going sledding, and coming inside, where my mom would make cocoa and doughnuts. Now that I'm older, I think about Christmases with my family and kids.
"I remember one time, I grew up in a two-story farmhouse, and somehow my dad got sled tracks on the roof. It confused the heck out of me. To this day, I don't know how he did it. I was about 8."
Bob Corbin, Crown Point city councilman
"It sounds corny, but I like having the family back together," said Corbin, who has a daughter in New York and a son in Chicago. He said this Christmas he will be busy keeping the family puppy, Oliver, from snatching ornaments off the Christmas tree and breaking them on the floor.
Dan Rohaley, chairman of the Crown Point Board of Zoning Appeals
Rohaley's family traditionally had gathered for a 5 p.m. Christmas Eve dinner, at which seven soups were served. After the seven soups, the family had a traditional dinner. He said the family had been doing the dinner since "before I was born" until about two years ago.
"I had to be there every year no matter what. After dinner we got to open presents, after the dishes were done," he said.
Barbara Kortokrax, Winfield zoning administrator/building coordinator
Kortokrax said her favorite Christmas memory is when she was 12 years old, and her sister pointed out Santa in the sky from her bedroom window. "She kept pointing and kept pointing and saying, 'Don't you see him?' I didn't, but my power of imagination was so strong that because she kept pointing, I began to see him. To this day, I still believe in Santa Claus."
Michael Boskovich, Highland school superintendent
Boskovich said he has many fond memories of Christmas growing up with his mother and father and six brothers and sisters. He said he remembers going with his family to pick out a tree and decorating it. "We would go to the lot and pick one out and we'd bring it home. My parents would put a little white picket fence around the tree and it held all of our Christmas gifts," he said. "The smell of evergreen was everywhere. It was a wonderful time. Coming from a large family, we really appreciated the one or two gifts that we each got. We cherished them. It was a happy time, a special time for all of us."
Thomas DeGiulio, Munster town manager
DeGiulio said at this time of year, he thinks about the people who are no longer with the family, like his mother and father. He said his father died when he was in college and his mother died in 1997. "In our family, Christmas Eve and Christmas Day are big family deals. I see my cousins, aunts and uncles and other family members, and think about how fortunate I have been."
Keith Soderquist, Lake Station mayor
Soderquist said the Jimmy Stewart movie, "It's a Wonderful Life," always gets him in the spirit of the holidays and reflective of accomplishments of the past year.
He said its his and his family's tradition, during the weekend following Thanksgiving, to watch the 1940s-circa movie while trimming their Christmas tree.
Brian Snedecor, Hobart mayor
Snedecor's childhood Christmas memories are traditional ones that include his relatives getting together on Christmas Day to eat dinner and open presents.
Time spent at church, which included singing carols and acting in plays, also was part of those special memories, Snedecor said.
He said his family also placed importance on helping others.
"One of the things that really sticks with me was helping those less fortunate," Snedecor said.
Rod Gonzalez, Hobart police chief
The focus for Gonzalez this Christmas, and in recent holidays past, is his three young children, now age 8, 6 and 3.
A tradition started by his wife is to make sure the children are decked out in new pajamas on Christmas Eve.
Christmas morning the kids are up by 6 a.m. opening their gifts, which this year will include a new Red Ryder BB gun for his son.
"It's a ball," Gonzalez said of his holiday plans.
Jeff White, Hobart deputy chief
White said it's traditional for him to go on Christmas Eve to his mom's house, where other family members also gather.
It's also traditional for his mother to have as part of her decorations an "awful green-colored artificial tree" that includes a mechanism that plays Christmas carols repeatedly.
"It's terrible. Every year I try and unplug it," White said.
Sheila Shine, Merrillville Planning and Building Department employee
Shine said her favorite holiday tradition was going to the mall on Christmas Eve with her husband, splitting up and buying a present for each other.
She said she and her husband, who has since passed away, would later meet for lunch and exchange their gifts.
"To me, that was the best thing," Shine said.
Lance Huish, Merrillville town councilman
Huish's favorite holiday moment came on Christmas Day in 2005 when he saw his first Green Bay Packers game at Lambeau Field.
Huish, a Packers fan, said he was thrilled when he was offered the tickets, but he was hesitant to accept them because he wasn't sure his children would want to spend Christmas watching a football game.
He said his two children "were pumped" to go to the game when they heard they had the opportunity.
Huish enjoyed the trip even though the Packers lost to the Chicago Bears that day.
Speros Batistatos, president and CEO of the South Shore Convention and Visitors Authority,
For Batistatos, the family Christmas meal has evolved into something less than traditional. The family now partakes in something other than turkey or ham, like steak.
"We did turkey on Thanksgiving," he said. "We do not do the turkey and mashed potatoes again."
Whatever the meal, though, it still includes having everybody over, he said.
As a child, Batistatos said his favorite memory is of growing up in Hobart and living on Lake George, where the children would build a huge hill from the back door down to the lake.
"We created a ramp to toboggan down the hill," he said. "We'd slide halfway across the lake."
Robert Golec, Hammond city clerk
It's a tradition for Golec's family to celebrate Christmas on Christmas Eve.
The family, which now includes grandchildren, feasts on the traditional Christmas ham during a sit-down dinner.
"All the family gets together if they're in the area," Golec said. The gathering now usually requires setting up card tables and extra chairs.
The celebration also includes the traditional exchange of gifts.
"That's been the tradition for years," Golec said. "You can almost say Christmas Day is the let-down day. It's a day of rest."
Golec said the Christmas Eve celebration is such a family anchor that when he served on the Hammond Fire Department, he and another firefighter, whose family celebrated the holiday on Christmas Day, would switch shifts to be able to observe the holiday with their families.
Dan Repay, Hammond City Council president
Repay said things are interesting year-round when it comes to gatherings of his large, close-knit, politically in-tune family. The holidays only amp things up.
"It's generally like a 'Meet the Press'-type of roundtable," he said. "There's lots of spirited discussion and good humor."
This Christmas, the clan of five brothers and one sister, their spouses and children will gather at the siblings' mother's house along with their mom's side of the family.
"I don't know how to fit everyone in," Repay said.
While there's no single traditional dish the whole family insists on during the holidays, Repay's favorite is what he describes as "bread doughballs" with sauerkraut, a dish he believes to be part of the Slovak side of his heritage.
He's also half Croatian.
"I get myself sick eating those things every year," he said.
