Christmas for Carrie Underwood hasn’t changed that much from when she was a young girl. She usually still gets together with her family, which includes her parents, two sisters and their families…as well as her own husband, Mike Fisher, and sons Isaiah and Jacob.
Carrie says some of her Christmas traditions include a lot of traveling to visit her family and her husband Mike Fisher’s family…but also cooking and celebrating the season. “My perfect Christmas, generally we do a lot of traveling around Christmas. We’ll go see either my family or my husband’s family,” says Carrie. “I’ll spend all day cooking. I’ll make a small turkey, even though I don’t eat turkey. I’ll make myself some tofurkey; cranberry sauce, of course. Of course, sweet potato casserole. You have to have that. That’s one of my favorites because it’s a side dish and dessert, but I’ll just make a ridiculous amount of food. Just celebrate, have a fire, we wait for Santa and open our presents, then we’re off to see the next group of family. It’s all about watching it through my sons’ eyes and just getting to spend time with family.”
She continues: “For me growing up, Christmas was always just comforting. We always had the same stockings and the same tree and the same decorations, and we would always decorate the weekend right after Thanksgiving. You know, flip the Christmas switch, put the tree up. Now that we’re adults and have kids, we can go to the Christmas tree farm and we can walk around, and we can pick out which one and ask Isaiah, ‘Which one do you think?’ Just things like that, making those memories. It’s just a joyful time of year.”
One of the traditions she enjoys with her own family is picking out a Christmas tree with her husband and two sons. “We were an artificial tree family growing up. It was easier, you know, but now in our own home, we do the real tree thing, and we kind of try to make that a little bit of a tradition. We go and we pick it out. The boys have some say in which one we get, and they feel some ownership and we all decorate it together and of course, have Christmas music playing in the house. I make cookies that were my husband’s grandmother that my kids call Gigi. It’s her recipe, her ginger snap cookies, and we make those and it’s super sweet. Isaiah loves makes Gigi’s cookies, because he still remembers her a little bit. So, it’s something special we get to do.”
One of her favorite memories from childhood was singing Christmas carols for folks in nursing homes. “Christmas was always just about family,” she says. “One thing that we always did growing up that was one of my favorite memories, we would on Christmas Eve we would go to my grandparents’ house. Us kids were always responsible for putting oranges and apples and bananas in little paper bags and we would go down to the nursing home and sing Christmas carols.”
Carrie released a special edition of her Christmas album, My Gift, this year, featuring “Favorite Time of Year,” and she says there’s nothing like Christmas music that gets you in the spirit of the season. “There is no other like part of the year that gets its own music, like exclusively. When you think about it, like entire radio stations switch over to play Christmas music around Christmas time. So, I feel like it just puts you in the mood for Christmas. Christmas is something that everybody looks forward to and to have Christmas music start playing way before Christmas. It usually does because people just can’t wait to get there. It puts you in a mood. It changes your state of mind. It gets you ready for it and it just makes you feel a certain way.”
Audio / CARRIE UNDERWOOD RECALLS MEMORIES OF PAST CHRISTMASES.
DownloadCarrie Underwood (Christmas memories) OC: …Christmas carols. :18
“Christmas was always just about family. One thing that we always did growing up that was one of my favorite memories, we would on Christmas Eve we would go to my grandparents’ house. Us kids were always responsible for putting oranges and apples and bananas in little paper bags and we would go down to the nursing home and sing Christmas carols.”
Audio / CARRIE UNDERWOOD TALKS ABOUT HER CHRISTMAS TRADITIONS.
DownloadCarrie Underwood (Christmas traditions) OC: …time of year. :35
“For me growing up, Christmas was always just comforting. We always had the same stockings and the same tree and the same decorations, and we would always decorate the weekend right after Thanksgiving. You know, flip the Christmas switch, put the tree up. Now that we’re adults and have kids, we can go to the Christmas tree farm and we can walk around, and we can pick out which one and ask Isaiah, ‘Which one do you think?’ Just things like that, making those memories. It’s just a joyful time of year.”
Audio / Carrie Underwood says one of her family’s traditions is to go pick out a real Christmas tree and put it up together.
DownloadCarrie Underwood (Christmas trees) OC: …get to do. :43
“We were an artificial tree family growing up. It was easier, you know, but now in our own home, we do the real tree thing, and we kind of try to make that a little bit of a tradition. We go and we pick it out. The boys have some say in which one we get, and they feel some ownership and we all decorate it together and of course, have Christmas music playing in the house. I make cookies that were my husband’s grandmother that my kids call Gigi. It’s her recipe, her ginger snap cookies, and we make those and it’s super sweet. Isaiah loves makes Gigi’s cookies, because he still remembers her a little bit. So, it’s something special we get to do.”
Audio / CARRIE UNDERWOOD SAYS HER CHRISTMAS HOLIDAYS USUALLY INCLUDE COOKING AND TRAVELING, BUT MOST IMPORTANTLY, FAMILY.
DownloadCarrie Underwood (perfect Christmas) OC: …with family. :40
“My perfect Christmas, generally we do a lot of traveling around Christmas. We’ll go see either my family or my husband’s family. I’ll spend all day cooking. I’ll make a small turkey, even though I don’t eat turkey. I’ll make myself some tofurkey; cranberry sauce, of course. Of course, sweet potato casserole. You have to have that. That’s one of my favorites because it’s a side dish and dessert, but I’ll just make a ridiculous amount of food. Just celebrate, have a fire, we wait for Santa and open our presents, then we’re off to see the next group of family. It’s all about watching it through my sons’ eyes and just getting to spend time with family.”
Audio / Carrie Underwood says her family has participated in a popular Christmas tradition for the past couple of years.
DownloadCarrie Underwood (Christmas PJs) OC: …tell you that. :18
“For the past few years, we all get matching PJs. Either we get them or somebody else gifts them to us, and we all match – my husband, myself, my sons and our dogs. And getting my german shepherd into a Christmas sweater is no easy feat, I will tell you that.”
Audio / CARRIE UNDERWOOD TALKS ABOUT CHRISTMAS MUSIC.
DownloadCarrie Underwood (Christmas music) OC: …a certain way. :37
“There is no other like part of the year that gets its own music, like exclusively. When you think about it, like entire radio stations switch over to play Christmas music around Christmas time. So, I feel like it just puts you in the mood for Christmas. Christmas is something that everybody looks forward to and to have Christmas music start playing way before Christmas. It usually does because people just can’t wait to get there. It puts you in a mood. It changes your state of mind. It gets you ready for it and it just makes you feel a certain way.”
Audio / CARRIE UNDERWOOD TALKS ABOUT THE SONG "FAVORITE TIME OF YEAR," WHICH IS INCLUDED ON THE SPECIAL EDITION OF HER CHRISTMAS ALBUM, MY GIFT.
DownloadCarrie Underwood (Favorite Time of Year) OC: …song collection. :34
“’Favorite Time of Year’ is a song about all of the things that make you smile during Christmas. There’s so much about Christmas that is absolutely wonderful. Obviously, the birth of Jesus, that’s what we’re celebrating, but there’s so many other things too – like the presents, the family, the weather, the decorations – just all those things all wrapped up to make the favoriteist time of year, the favorite of year. So, I love the song because it’s hard to sing it without smiling. It’s hard to listen to it without smiling. I think it’s a perfect edition to the rest of my Christmas song collection.”
