Your Seasonal Celebrations and Traditions Over the Years?

[Bugbear]

What are your celebrations and traditions of late fall and early winter? Do they differ, now, from the celebrations and traditions of your childhood?

[creagdhubh]

For late fall and winter here's the main line up - Thanksgiving, St. Andrew's Day, Christmas, Hogmanay, and Burns Night. All of which involving Highland dance, plenty of reels, music, good food and drink, story-telling, poetry, and a wonderful time spent with good mates and a loving Scottish family!



Happy Christmas and slainte mhath!

[Peter Crowe]

I celebrate Thanksgiving, since being married to an American (even when we lived in Scotland). I celebrate Christmas and the New Year. I also celebrate Burns Night.

I must be honest I have never celebrated St. Andrew's day, and when I lived in Scotland nobody I knew did either.

The biggest change in how something is celebrated in my lifetime has been the New Year. In my family and many others (in Scotland) no-one celebrated Hogmonay, that was a day of preparation for the Bells (because you celebrate the New Year coming in, not the old one that is over) when we had our first toast before going out first-footing and/or receiving a first foot and other visitors (a first foot must be male, preferably tall and dark) for anything between a couple of hours, and for some heroes I've known more than 24 hours. Even as quite young children we would go to bed early on Hogmonay evening and be woken at about 11pm put through a quick bath and dressed in our best clothes (usually my kilt) for the Bells, when my sister would get a babycham and I would have a glass of sweet (alcoholic) cider both diluted with lemonade (which in the UK is something akin to sprite or 7Up).

Trying to maintain the old Scottish customs of New Year was becoming more difficult in Scotland (due to the increasing dominance of Anglo-American media and cultural attrition) before I left, and nigh on impossible living in the United States.

I do lament the demise of the traditional Scots celebration of New Year, but it has been in decline throughout my life.

[Bugbear]

People put up Christmas lights in my home town, but on Christmas Eve, a lot of people traditionally put out luminarias (small, brown paper bags, partly filled with sand and a lit candle) lining the sidewalks and drives, etc. It can be quite pretty, in a Southwest way. I seem to recall this also being done on fall and winter occasions other than Christmas Eve. There are electric light versions of this now.

My family did not participate in the luminaria tradition, though I did help fill paper bags with sand one year at a school I attended. This is still done around the region: for example in Santa Fe, NM.

[CopperNGold]

The luminarias during the holiday season in Santa Fe are breathtaking!

[CDNSushi]

My favourite winter holiday by far is Hanukkah. Even though this is more to do with late fall, early winter, the date of Hanukkah varies from year to year, and some years it's most certainly early winter (at least around these parts). I never grew up with it, but since I've been married it has become a part of our yearly tradition. The Hanukkah lights are beautiful, but I also love the blessings, traditions, and foods eaten around this time. Even though we are Christian, we observe many of the Jewish holidays, and this is no exception. (We believe that Jesus celebrated Hanukkah, actually. I taught a sermon on this one year, as a lay minister).

This is very different from my childhood. Nothing was celebrated in the late fall, early winter... Just Christmas. Being from a Czech family, we observed many of the Czech Christmas traditions for many years. These include many old superstitions and magic, strangely enough.

To save me a lot of typing, I'll simply include a link to a site that describes many of these dates, traditions, and customs very well -- put together by a Czech society in Nebraska. http://www.nebraskaczechsofyork.org/...traditions.htm

But long story short, mom would always bake traditional Christmas cookies, we would decorate the Christmas tree on Christmas Eve, and most certainly have carp (which we replaced with other fish in later years) for supper... Fond memories for sure!

My wife and I still adhere to bits and pieces of this, but it's a lot more difficult. The wife won't let me wait until the 24th to put up a tree, and she really doesn't like us opening gifts on the 24th -- just doesn't seem right to her. And the fish for supper thing is odd for her too, but she generally indulges me, albeit grudgingly. This is part of the reason why I'm so happy to celebrate Hanukkah -- because it's something that we can both agree on and there are no disputes about our individual traditions growing up, and which we should observe.

[Bugbear]

Thanks for posting the link to the "Czech Christmas Traditions," Sushi.

[AKScott]

Well, my sister married an Episcopalian, so now we celebrate all twelve days of Christmas. My wife is very happy with that idea.

I have added Saint Andrews day as a late season day to be kilted, weather permitting.

[RAF]

As a kid the Fall Holidays were Halloween and Thanksgiving. So at a young age those were about candy and costumes, and feasting and Pilgrims and Indians respectively. As an adult I do not celebrate Halloween, although the sweet tooth lingers and I can appreciate more the Pagan symbolism surrounding All-Hallows Even.
Thanksgiving has morphed into "family time." Giving thanks for what we have, just spending time together and honoring and remembering those who are no longer with us. My Dad passed away in March of 2010. His favorite holiday was Thanksgiving, so it has taken on an even more special significance recently.
The Winter holiday was Christmas.
When we were young my brother and I would go out into the woods (we lived in Vermont) with my Dad and select and cut down a pine tree to bring home and decorate. I realize how fortunate I was when I remember these times - they seem down right Rockwellian. We would come back in from the snowy cold with the tree and the house would smell of baking bread and mulled spices. My Mom was in charge of the cooking and the decorating. She would tell me the best way to tell if the lights were evenly distributed throughout the tree was to squint my eyes - this would make it easier to see blank spots. I was very impressed with this tip when I was little. I confess I still do this when I put the lights on the Christmas tree. I especially liked putting the ornaments on the tree - my parents had kept so many for so many years, some were quite old even then. Many of them my Mom still has today.
New Years celebrations were for the adults. Although I do remember being allowed a couple of times to stay up until midnight and toast with sparkling apple juice and thinking I was one of the swells. I later graduated to Rob Roys, and eventually - finally, champagne.
Interestingly, or maybe not, today I find New Years to be a very private event. It's usually just me and my husband - a midnight kiss, a quick toast, a call to Mom (if she didn't call me at 9 before SHE went to bed) and to sleep.
I have yet to attend a Burns Supper, but am very interested to do so - maybe Jan. of 2012. We'll see...
If you've made it this far give yourself a treat of some kind :-)

[Bugbear]

The luminarias during the holiday season in Santa Fe are breathtaking!

Yes, and someone sent a PM saying they are used in other regions of the country; that would be the Southeast. I have only seen the Southwest tradition. I'm sure if one were to google "Santa Fe" and
"luminarias," there would be many pictures along with explanations and descriptions of the tradition.