Christmas Catch-up ...

As I haven't had time to write posts for the last five days, I've decided to play catch-up with this entry and include the past entries in this post.

When I was in elementary school, each classroom would have a Christmas party on one of the last few days before the Christmas break. Usually, we would make Christmas ornaments for our parents, and maybe have some snacks. As I got older and went to Middle and High school, I didn't have classrooms that had parties. Instead, my classmates and I would either watch a movie or would make stuff such as Christmas decorations or little Christmas boxes. In my German classes, we would make Christmas cards in German for our parents. As far as I can remember, most of the schools that I attended did not have any Christmas pageants. When I attended my second high school, the school had a Christmas concert in the gym. I don't know if one would consider it a Christmas pageant, but I believe that is the closest that I have come to one. ...

As for Christmas celebrations or Christmas services, the churches that my family attended always had a Christmas Eve service. I have only been to a couple of Christmas Eve services. At Ward's, the first church my family attended, they had an evening service. The pews would be decorated with garland-wrapped poles and lit candles on top. From what I can remember of the service I attended, the sermon was on Jesus' birth. In addition to a Christmas Eve service, Ward's had a Midnight New Year's Eve service, but I never went to one of the services. After my family moved, we attended another church. This church had at least two evening Christmas Eve services. Again, the sermon was on Jesus' birth, but there would be music at the services. A couple of times, my mom played the piano for the services. Another difference was that all of the attendees held candles that were lit during the service. (Yes, even kids were allowed to hold candles, but the parents kept an eye on them. They were only lit for a couple of minutes, and then they were blown out.) In addition to holding candles, we would also sing songs. ...

As for stockings, both my brother and I had stockings. We did not hang our stocking up every year, but when we did, we hung on the mantle of the fireplace. The few times that we did hang up our stockings, our stockings were filled with small presents, like socks or movies. Of course, the presents in our stockings were not the only the presents we got. We did get other presents. ...

Speaking of presents, they had to be bought. Until the past couple of years, I didn't really buy Christmas presents. I don't know when my parents went shopping as I never went looking for my parents' hiding place for the presents. I only started to buy gifts a few years ago, and when I did, I bought gifts at book sales on my school's campus. I guess you could say that I bought gifts early since the sales were at least a couple of weeks before my school went on Christmas break. ...

When it comes to Christmas, though, I don't associate remembering dead relatives with Christmas. I don't visit cemeteries at Christmas time, since my ancestors are buried in cemeteries to far away from home. As for remembering deceased relatives, we would talk about fond memories that we had of them. Of course, we did not just talk about relatives. At one Christmas dinner, we reminisced about one of the pastors at Ward's who had passed away just a few days before that Christmas. ...

As for music, we listened to Christmas music in the car and on the radio on days before Christmas and on Christmas. (I don't have a favorite Christmas song, but I like several of the Christmas songs.) We did not go caroling, although one year a group of neighborhood children went door to door caroling. ...

As you can see, I've had quite a bit of catching up to do. Hopefully, I'll be able to contribute to the next two entries.