During more recent times Christmas has regained some magic for me in the form of "Christingle", which is celebrated as a service in a church near my daughter Caroline's home. The whole family go and the church is always full to overflowing, partly due to the priest who presents a service which appeals to children and adults. He has created various characters which appear on strings from the church ceiling, the main character is a duck, and a Christmas scene is gradually built with children looking for the Three Wise Men, Mary and Joseph and so on, which are hidden around the church. Christingles are handed out and lit while the lights are switched off, the effect is beautiful.
One of my favourite Xmas memories as a child involved standing at the dock across the street from my home, waiting for the Santa ship to sail into the bay and dock. It was magical, lit up with coloured lights. On board were dozens of elves, carolers, Santa, Mrs. Claus, a sleigh, presents for children, such as myself. We would go aboard, join in the singing, eat mandarin oranges, Xmas cookies, and open presents. Then we would watch a firework display. Wonderful! This ship traveled up and down the coast of Vancouver Island, reaching many remote settlements as well as the more inhabited ones.
My magical memory was an annual Christmas village on one of the floors of a department store in downtown Pittsburgh. I just remember going up the escalator and walking into the most beautiful place I ever saw....in my child mind I think I thought I was in heaven for some reason. Later when I would go there as an older child with one of my younger sisters I would always be amazed that I though this kind of small and crappy display was magical, lol! The eyes of a child.
@Chrissy Page , I think your vision of Christmas is seen by most children. Althought I wast not allow Santa's Christmas, I admit to peeking into the windows of the downtown department stores when one of my foster families took their children to look at the lights and displays. I too thought it was a glorious sight.
Thank you @Chrissy Page. I told @Lara Moss I would fall on my face if left to my own devices. If there is any saving of this thread, I'm not sure of how to do it.
I think part of the problem is we have quite a few different threads going about December and Christmas. Great Pic of you, did you do that or is it photoshop?
https://www.whychristmas.com/cultures/ I found this really neat website that tells us all about Christmas. How it is celebrated around the World, Christmas traditions, the Christmas Story, etc. One stop "shopping" for all you might want to know about Christmas. And since it's that time of year...you might want to stop in and check out the info...some of it might be things you already know, but there's alot of things you probably don't know too. Like this for instance: The custom of kissing under Mistletoe comes from England. The original custom was that a berry was picked from the sprig of Mistletoe before the person could be kissed and when all the berries had gone, there could be no more kissing!
Here's a good one to pop back up at this time of the year. I was going to post about the traditional lutefisk that we'd have every Christmas then, thinking that I must have already done that, I did a search and found this thread. If you haven't already posted in this thread, tell us about what Christmas was like in your family, wherever you lived, as well as what it's like now, if you prefer.
@Ken Anderson. Is the forum's official Christmas thread? As you all know by now I live in Australia.. or as you Yanks prefer to call it Down Under. We have a vastly different Chrissie to most people on CoC as it falls smack bang in the middle of our summer. Instead of warm roasts, poultry and veggies and warm imbibes like Gluhwein we eat cold foods at Chrissie. Like smatterings of cool prawns (shrimps) lobster and crab meat (if avail and cheap) turkey, chicken or ham all washed down with gallons of ice cold beer or Aussie wine. Instead of cold weather, even snow as some of your states experience at Christmas.. we have warm, sunny days end on end so many head to the beach or a local swimming pool. My family have been lucky in that we have always had our own swimming pool. One of the best things I can remember about past Christmas days was our post lunch cricket games. I had great enjoyment diving full long into the clear pool water to snaffle a hard hit ball before it landed. Great memories of my Christmas days Down Under.
I think we can have more than one Christmas thread, since there are different things about Christmas. This thread is about the various Christmas traditions in different countries or places.
So where is the official Christmas greeting thread. As you know Oz is a half day ahead of America so myself and Milla Jonas will be first to Chrissie Day.
I would say THIS ONE, not because I started it but because it's the oldest and one of the larger ones, and because it doesn't specify any one aspect of the holiday.