By: Hannah Johnson
The Ranger community looks forward to their three-week winter break vacation and celebrating family holiday traditions.
After a long first semester, many students are anticipating the holidays after finals week. Family traditions are especially a big part of the holiday season.
Noah Chavez ’26 says he loves spending time with his family on Christmas, “Me and my family stay up on Christmas Eve until midnight and play games.” Chavez says he also loves baking homemade sugar cookies with his family and decorating them together.
His favorite part of Christmas break is being home and away from school. Chavez says his favorite Christmas song is All I Want is You by Mariah Carey.
Lilly Schmierer, ’24 says her favorite Christmas food is sugar cookies she makes with her grandma. Schmierer says, “The week before, my whole family comes together to make tamales.”
Her favorite part of Christmas is having a secret Santa with her cousins. She says, “being able to hang out with my family and go on trips” is her favorite part of the break. Schmierer believes that break shouldn’t be longer or shorter.
This year she will be spending the three weeks off hanging out with her sister until she has to go back to Montana.
Brooklyn Amstutz ’25 says, “My grandma always makes the best tamales.” While eating her tamales, Amstutz loves “watching a Christmas movie with dinner”. She says her “favorite part of break is being able to see family”.
Amstutz says, “In the beginning, I really like having a break and relaxing, but then I begin to miss school”. A lot of people also tend to miss school near the end of the break, so she thinks the break should only be two weeks. Her Christmas plans usually consist of going out of town or visiting family.
Although Amstutz loves cooking tamales, she says, “My favorite part is sitting around and opening presents together”. She loves real trees saying, “The smell just gives off a Christmas vibe”. Her favorite Christmas song is White Christmas by Michael Bublé.
Micah Stipech’s ’23 family loves Christmas saying, “We’re kind of a huge Christmas family so we have a million traditions.” They love Christmas so much that they “decorate for Christmas every year for Halloween.”
Stipech says their traditions consist of watching, “a lot of Christmas movies throughout the season.” Their family even makes their own hot cocoa mix. On average, each family usually has one Christmas tree, but Stipech’s family has seven full-sized trees.
He says his favorite part of Christmas is “…the spirit of giving. There’s just something about the Christmas air that just feels better.” He spends a “solid first week just cleaning my house because it lets me do nothing for the next two weeks. Then I can perfect all of my random hobbies.”
Stipech’s favorite Christmas song is Carol of the Bells and says, “I hate a lot of Christmas music and I love a lot of Christmas music. It’s very polarizing for me.”
Rangers will return from their hiatus on January 9th, 2023.
Hannah Johnson
Hannah Johnson, '25 is a first-year journalism writer for the Redwood Gigantea. She is interested in writing about the Clubs & Lifestyles section. You can reach her at hanna.jo8367@vusd.us.
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