All people have their own traditions and memories surrounding this season. For me it has always been a time to come together as a family and spend time with each other. We celebrate Christmas on the 24th of December in Sweden, and in this post I will share some of my traditions and memories.
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Did you hang Christmas stockings? By a fireplace, or somewhere else?
In Sweden we don't really have the tradition of hanging stockings and waiting for Santa to fill them. I think that might be an American tradition even? I haven't really seen it here in the UK either. However I don't mind it and it gives a very cost Christmasy feeling to it, and also fun for the kids.
Did you (and your siblings/family members) want to rush through the gift giving? Was there a sense of order and gratitude opening gifts, or was it wrapping-paper mayhem?
Our family love giving gifts and every since I was a small child I can remember the mounds of Christmas gifts under the Christmas tree. When we opened the gifts it would definitely be a wrapping-paper mayhem, but our parents always asked us to stop and play a bit with some of the thing
s we had opened before continuing, and also to always say thank you. Do I would say that as a child you get so excited to open everything, and as a parent it is a golden moment to teach about gratitude and patience.
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Did you write letters to Santa? If so, where did you mail them?
I always wrote a wishing list to Santa. Me and my brother's and/or friends would get the toy catalogue and cut out the things we liked and glue it on the wish-list. I would then give it to my parents that would 'make sure Santa got it'. It would usually pretty much be a paper filled with uneven cut out toys that was super expensive, but in the end it was the making of the letter and the magic behind it that was the fun!
Where did you live when you were growing up? Did you generally have a white Christmas?
When I was a small child up to I was 15 years old we were living up in the woods of Sweden, in the countryside. Very remote from civilization in a four bedroom typical Swedish house. To this day we still have the house and spend our summers there.
During my childhood we always had loads of snow up there, and as far as I can remember my childhood Christmases was always white, and cold! Sometimes around -35 celcius!
What makes Christmas for you?
Christmas for me first begins when all the Christmas ornaments and music is up and running in the shops. The Pouges "Fairytale of New York" is my personal Christmas song, and makes me filled with memories of my childhood and that cosy feeling only Christmas has to it. Other than that all the fairy lights and decorations of people's homes, and of course being able to spend time with loved ones.
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~ linnity