Twelve Traditions of Christmas - Part 8

CAROLS SUNG, GIFTS PRODUCED.   This is another tradition borrowed from my parents.  Simply bringing your gifts down on Christmas Eve  and plopping them under the tree didn't provide enough pomp and circumstance, so after supper, with the room lit only by the Christmas tree lights we would gather around the piano.  My mother would play Christmas hymns and carols out of a book called "The Fireside Book of Folk Songs" and while we were singing, family members would slip away one by one to get their presents and put them under the tree. I still remember the delight of hearing people stuffing their gifts under the tree and then getting the gentle prodding that meant it was my turn to do likewise. It doesn't get much better than that, folks!  


After I got married and we started having children, I discovered that my husband didn't have a lot of Christmas traditions to bring to the table, so we've been pretty much feasting on all of mine and this is one of my favorites. Now I'm the one playing the Christmas carols and hymns out of the same book and although I'm not the musician my mother was, everyone sings so loudly that the pleasant din nicely covers up my many mistakes.

When the gifts are all brought down, we allow a little subtle peeking, but no handling of gifts!  The lights stay off and the mystery remains.  We don't open any gifts until Christmas morning.  One year when our first-born was still pretty young, but old enough to get excited about gifts, we decided that it wouldn't really do any harm to let him open just one gift on Christmas Eve - just enough to keep him satisfied until the rest were opened the next day.  What we discovered instead was that this one gift awakened a ferocious appetite for more and was somewhat akin to opening Pandora's box.  Oops.  Well, we were young and inexperienced.  That was the only time we tried that little experiment.  

 

Twelve Traditions of Christmas - Part 7

THE EMPTY TREE.   As far as I know, this tradition is somewhat unique to our family.  When I was growing up, we never put any presents under the tree until Christmas Eve. This lent even more mystery and anticipation to our Christmas celebration.  Gifts were purchased, wrapped and then hidden within our rooms until the moment arrived for revealing that which had been concealed.  I never knew until we had 6 children of our own that there was a very practical reason for this tradition - it removed a lot of stress not having to worry about all those curious hands getting into the packages all season long.

So when we get our tree, we wrap lights around it and we put ornaments all over it, but we put nothing underneath it except the Christmas tree skirt.  We are waiting, hoping, anticipating and dreaming, just as the Jews of long ago did when the promises of a Messiah were yet unfulfilled.  We are confident and expectant, full of faith that what has been hidden will be revealed.  

Twelve Traditions of Christmas - Part 6

FUNKY CHOIR BOYS.  This is a relatively recent tradition, actually.  We inherited 4 choir boys from my husband's parents when they moved.  Naturally, I found them charming and started putting them up in our windowsills when I did the rest of the Christmas decorating.   I had them facing inward, but mysteriously, I kept finding them turned around.  The story came out: others found them creepy and when I wasn't in the room, someone would turn them to face outward so we didn't have to look at their faces.   I mean, really!  Look at these cherubic faces and ask yourself how anyone could find them creepy.  A tradition was born.

I continue to put these out on our windowsills every year when I do our Christmas decorating.  For the rest of the season, silent and anonymous stalkers turn them around when I'm out of the room. And when they're not around, I turn them back again.  The key thing is not to get caught in the act.  No one really talks about it either - it's an unspoken vigilance.

Long may they sing.

Twelve Traditions of Christmas - Part 5

PAPER CHAINS.  I'm not sure what you call these:  Advent rings?  Count-down paper chains?   Whatever they are, we have been making these paper chains as a way of counting down to Christmas for many, many years.   Ideally, the rings have been made in a timely manner so that each person can start tearing one off every day starting on December 1.  We always used red and green paper, but a few years ago, someone had the brilliant idea of using white paper for Sundays and special paper for Christmas Day.  Back in the day, we had six chains going, but somehow the enthusiasm for this quaint tradition seems to ebb as the children get older and the number of chains keeps diminishing.  

True story:  one year when I was a 9 or 10 years old, I was so deflated on the day after Christmas (all that waiting and then Christmas goes by so fast!) that I decided to make a paper chain of 365 rings to start counting down to Christmas again.  I still remember that absurdly long chain hanging in great loops in my closet, so symbolic of my longing for Christmas.  As the year went by, I kept forgetting to tear rings off and then I'd have to go and figure out how many I was behind and do a bunch at once.  I think the shine wore off that experience very quickly and I did not repeat it.

This year, for the first time, we all forgot about the paper chains until mid-December.  I fear an era has passed and will not be renewed until there are little ones in the family again.

Twelve Traditions of Christmas - Part 4

ADVENT CANDLES.  About the time our oldest child was around 6 years old, we were introduced to the celebration of Advent Sundays using a special circular candle holder with places for four candles, one for each of the four Sundays in Advent.  We decided that the space in the middle should be for a larger candle that we could light on Christmas Eve.  Neither of us had observed this particular tradition in our growing up years, so we had to sort of fudge our way through it for the first few years.  I bought the Advent items at the local Christian book store and it seems to me it probably came with four purple candles.  We improvised on the middle candle and used the unity candle from our wedding.  Why not?  And so it began.

We started out using an Advent devotional put out by Focus on the Family with readings by R.C. Sproul, Charles Swindoll and others, Scripture readings, and Christmas carols to sing.  Years later, we came across an interesting and unique Advent family liturgy which was rich in symbolism, and heavy on the singing of "O Come, O Come Emmanuel."   It started on December 16th and was completed on December 25th.  Each day we would dip our fingers in vinegar and sand and touch our tongues with the combination.  The vinegar and sand were to symbolize the desert bitterness, the years of Israel's wanderings and longing for a Messiah.  The constant refrain was "God was good to us, yet we rebelled.  How can we find forgiveness?"  At each place there were empty wine glasses, waiting to be filled on Christmas Day.  There were tiny chocolates to be eaten after each day's liturgy was done, a foretaste of more serious chocolate feasting on Christmas Day.  All in all, it was very memorable, but we found we didn't want to do it every year.

Our current practice is to light the candle(s), do the appropriate Advent readings from a lectionary, sing a couple Christmas hymns/carols and then drink eggnog.  I can't really give any significance to the eggnog - we just threw it in the mix because we all like it.   This year, I transgressed the sacred tradition and bought a different holiday drink one week instead of eggnog - it was some sort of Irish Cream stuff, which was so horrible that most of us couldn't drink it.  I have repented.  It shall not happen again.

We will continue to light the candles and wait for Christ.  He has come.  He is coming again!

Twelve Traditions of Christmas - Part 3

YE OLDE ADVENT CALENDAR.  Back in the mid-1950's, a friend of my parents gave them an Advent calendar. Although we may have used it occasionally when we were small, I don't remember it being a staple of my growing up years.  Lo and behold, I grew up, got married, we started our family, and the calendar was offered to us.  Is it possible that no one else wanted it?  Whatever the reason, this little handmade, unique treasure is now ours and we have used it every year since we received it.  The calendar is made of green felt, with a large white felt Christmas tree sewn onto the middle.  There are 13 pockets on the top and bottom of the calendar, each pocket having an ornament to pin onto the tree, and each pocket containing a poem or saying that goes with the ornament.  It's truly charming!  I'll admit that the poems and sayings are often schmaltzy and sentimental, but they were hand-typed onto the papers, typos and all, and we have grown to appreciate them.  By now the papers are starting to tear at the fold marks and I wonder if they'll last another generation.

When our children were young, I had to develop a schedule for putting the ornaments on to avoid arguments.  EVERYONE wanted to put the star on the tree top!   If it wasn't your year to put the star on top, you could hope for getting the ornament on Christmas Day, which is a tiny little manger scene.  The piece of paper in that pocket says simply:  "For Christmas story, read Luke 2."   Over the years, some of the ornaments have deteriorated and/or broken and have had to be replaced.  I think we are on our third snowflake now.  One year the candle poem disappeared and I had to find a new one (suitably schmaltzy and sentimental) to replace it.  The Santa ornament contains a fairly longish story about the history of Saint Nicholas, the Bishop of Myra, on whom the myth of Santa Claus is based.  And make no mistake, though some of the poems and sayings give a nod to good old Santa, the thread of truth remains woven through the rest:  we are looking toward and celebrating the birth of Christ.

I still put the calendar up every year, although the schedule is no longer needed and I often end up placing the ornaments on the tree myself.  Sometimes the poems and stories in the pockets don't get read.  But we keep the tradition and day by day, the tree gets filled, anticipation builds and the Advent of Christ is observed.  May it ever be so.

Twelve Traditions of Christmas - Part 2

THE REAL THING.  It's gotta be a real tree and that's final.  Tradition dictates that we go out the Friday or Saturday after Thanksgiving and cut one down ourselves, but I will admit (shhh...don't tell our kids) that years ago our standards weren't nearly so finicky and we were just as happy to get one off a tree lot that had already received the short, sharp shock at the hands of someone else.  This year Thanksgiving came so early that we found we just weren't in the mood (most of us anyway), so we waited a week.  See?  We're not completely inflexible!  Since we moved to our current location, we go to a place called "Twiehof's" and it gives me immense pleasure to be able to say that we get our Christmas Twee at Twiehof's.

 Lately we've been getting Scotch pines, but over the years we've sampled all kinds of evergreens, once even shelling out the big bucks for a Fraser Fir, the Cadillac of fir trees.  The Scotch pine is pleasingly soft, although its long needles sometimes make it harder to hang ornaments.  The aroma of a freshly cut evergreen fills the room such that you find yourself taking deeper breaths just to fully imbibe it.

 I've read that the tradition of a Christmas tree comes down to us from Germany, some sort of pagan winter solstice thing.  We are reclaiming it for Christ.  When we sit in a darkened room lit only by the lights of our tree, it is a reminder that Christ brought His light into the darkness.  We are reclaiming it for Christ, who gave His life to bring us that light, just as the tree gives its life.  We are reclaiming it for Christ, who gives us life everlasting, who makes us "evergreen."

Twelve Traditions of Christmas - Part 1

Blog? What blog?  So much for my goal of blogging at least twice a month (which sounded sort of minimal as it was).   I could make all sorts of excuses, but nobody wants to hear those.  I'm experiencing a "move on" moment in the form of an idea I had about writing about some of our Christmas traditions.   Don't expect to hear the kinds of things that will make you want to take notes - it's all very simple, really.  Some of our traditions have come from my growing up years, others are things that have evolved while our own children have been growing up.  That's all the introduction I've got, so here goes Number 1 (not in any order of importance, mind you, but somewhat in chronological order).

CHRISTMAS MUSIC BANS AND BLESSINGS.  No Christmas Music until After Thanksgiving!   I mean it!   I happen to love Christmas music of almost all kinds (exceptions will be noted below). However, I like the anticipation of waiting to hear it and then the closure of putting those things away until the next year after the season is over.  We have a maverick in our household who occasionally likes to get everyone riled up by playing Christmas music at unapproved times, but for the most part, we have a united front on this one.

Full disclosure:  I'm not as fond of some of the secular Christmas songs.  "Jingle bells," "I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus," "Frosty the Snowman," "Santa Claus is Coming to Town"...they all leave me kind of cold.  "I'll Be Home For Christmas" always reminds me of the first year we didn't go home for Christmas after we moved to Indiana, so I've got a big soft spot in my heart for that one.  My real favorites are the ones I grew up with, the ones that tell the story of Jesus: "O Little Town of Bethlehem," "O Come All Ye Faithful," "Hark the Herald Angels Sing," Joy to the World" and so forth.  Think about it, it's the one time of year when everywhere you go (literally!) you are surrounded by the gospel, saturated with it.

Having said all that, I don't think I'd be terribly unhappy if "The Little Drummer Boy" got dropped off everyone's playlist.  Pa rum pa pum pum!