FIRST FRIDAY FIVE
DECEMBER 2021
OUR YULE TRADITIONS OLD AND NEW
I have been following Katherine's, from I WISH I LIVED IN A LIBRARY, Friday Five posts and decided to jump on the idea. My blogging has been suffering from a case of the blahs, and I thought some new features might liven things up! As with Katherine's feature I will have different topics which have caught my fancy.
YULE
The twelve days of Yule run from the Solstice until New Year's Day. My first experience with Yule was in my early 20s. The landlord at my college apartment threw a Yule dinner party every year for his student renters, who were usually from various religious backgrounds. The years I was there, there were: Jewish, Buddhist, and Hindu students, as well as an Atheist. I have embraced the season ever since living there. Yule has its roots in Paganism, but it's a wonderful way to celebrate if you observe Xmas only in a secular way (my son and I), or you have friends and family with multiple religious beliefs. It also allows us to celebrate in a less commercial way; which was important to me when my son was young.
OUR FAMILY'S FIVE TOP YULE TRADITIONS
1. A Yule dinner on the Winter Solstice.
I usually have a simple candlelit dinner with immediate family and close friends which has a hearty homemade soup, home baked bread, and pomegranate punch on the menu, as well as spice cookies of some sort and apple cake for dessert. We exchange small seasonal tokens, such as: candles, nuts, fruit, home baked cookies, or a small handmade gift. We usually play cards after dinner. Our Yule celebrations are focused on love, family, and friendship.
2. We decorate our tree on the Solstice.
I have always put up our tree the Saturday closest to two weeks after the first. We would decorate it the next day, have pizza and Xmas cookies and watch a Christmasy movie afterwards, but after The Ex left (and it was just myself and a teenage Baz) we started putting the lights and star on only and decorating it on the Solstice. That way if friends and family, who are coming over for Yule dinner, want to join in they can come over a little early and help.
3. We exchange books and cookies on Xmas Eve.
I think I love Xmas Eve at our house more than Xmas Day to be honest! We also have Chinese takeout for dinner and play boardgames. It used to specifically be Scrabble, but the year we moved house we couldn't find the Scrabble game and it made me loosen my holiday "rules" a bit. Ha ha. We save our fortune cookies and open them on New Year's Eve.
4. Xmas Day traditions.
. Adults get stockings stuffed full of candy! Baz is an expert stocking stuffer. This was my stocking from last year.
I started making Pillsbury cinnamon buns for Xmas morning breakfast with my sister after she came to live with me, when she was twelve. The first year The Ex was moved in with me I even tried making them from scratch to impress him. They were a disaster, so I went back to the good old Pillsbury tube after that. Ha ha!
After Baz was born we were always at the mall on Christmas Eve Day picking up last minute holiday necessities, like wrapping paper and tape, so we started buying Cinnabon rolls for the next morning. The last few years Baz has been getting them from a local bakery he passes on his walk to and from work. My sister still makes Pillsbury rolls with her sons; which gives me the warm fuzzies. I will make cheesy scrambled eggs if anyone wants them, but that's the extent of my Xmas morning cooking!
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Two of my cousins married first generation Italian-Americans, and seeing there was a large age difference between us I grew up with Italian holiday traditions, so I make lasagna every year instead of ham or poultry. We have cheesecake, and in recent years, gelato for dessert.
5. Yule New Year traditions.
When my son was young we had some sort of tradition every day during Yule, from the Solstice to New Years Day. Now we only celebrate five days of the twelve, with New Year's Eve and New Year's Day being the last two. New Years Eve we exchange beverage gifts like: specialty teas and coffees, spirits, glass bottle sodas, and hot chocolate mixes. Attached to the drink gift is a note with a wish for the person in the new year, or a promise, and sometimes even an apology. Besides the usual New Year celebrations we open our Xmas Eve fortune cookies and read them aloud at midnight.
New Year's Day we exchange calendars, or other types of organizational stationery and there is no technology or video games all day. We usually watch movies, play cards and/or boardgames and start a jigsaw puzzle.
NEW YULE TRADITIONS
One thing I love about the holidays is the new traditions that evolve as our families and/or circumstances change.
1. The Julbock.
An old high school friend, who now lives in Sweden, sent me an authentic straw Julbock last year and now it will be part of our Yule dinner table decorations every year.
2. The Irish wake cake.
I have always made an apple cake of some kind for Yule dinner, but I thought I would try something new this year. I saw it on Katherine's blog, I WISH I LIVED IN A LIBRARY, she made one and it sounds delicious!
I want to decorate it similar to this. If I can find blood oranges this year. No one has them currently, or pomegranates.
ETSY
3. The wheat sheaf.
Another new Yule dinner table decoration and tradition this year is a sheaf of wheat. The next day I will put it outside to feed the birds.
4. The bayberry candle.
"A bayberry candle burned to the socket brings joy to the heart and gold to the pocket." You light it at sundown and let it burn itself out on either Xmas Eve, or New Year's Eve. Buy the shorter candles so you aren't staying up all night waiting for it to extinguish itself. Ha ha. I'm going to do mine on Xmas Eve. My mother always had large bayberry pillar candles placed around the house for the holidays. They don't have to be burned to scent the room. I stumbled across this poem and tradition last year.
5. The Krampus in the Corner.
Move over Elf on the Shelf... Krampus is in town! I purchased a sew-it-youself Krampus in the Corner on Etsy last year. I was planning on finishing him by December first, and then having him do good deeds until the Solstice, but I haven't had much time to work on him, so I guess he'll do good deeds during the twelve days of Yule.
This is what he will look like when he's finished. I hope, ha ha!
What are your holiday traditions?
Do you have a favorite holiday food?
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