Hey Pandas, Do You Have Any Weird, Funny, Or Interesting Christmas Traditions? (Closed)

Well, it's kinda getting close to Christmas, so it might be nice to hear your favorite Christmas traditions, bonus points if they're funny or weird.

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Spaghetti and meatballs. Christmas Eve was my parents’ anniversary, so mom would make the sauce and the meatballs ahead of time, so on Christmas Eve all she had to do to feed three hungry boys was cook some spaghetti. We ate, and were told to make ourselves scarce (upstairs in our rooms) until morning. Dad and mom took some time to celebrate, then set up Christmas morning for us. I'll be having spaghetti and meatballs on December 24th. I'm 74, and they've been gone 31 years now, but some things are important.

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Final score:

10points

Robert Trebor

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Cindy Brick 11 months ago

I can relate -- Dec. 26 is our anniversary! Been married more than 40 years now...

0points

My Grandma started this. We were all given an unlit candle and then went one by one from oldest to youngest into the dining room, which was completely dark apart from one large lit candle on the table, which we lit our candle from.
By the time the whole family and friends were in the room, it had turned from a cold dark room into a room full full of soft warm light. Then we all hugged and kissed and wished each other a "Happy Christmas and a loving New Year!".

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Final score:

10points

Lady Emsworth

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Lene 11 months ago

This is a wonderful way to celebrate the returning of light! I may adopt this in som way if that's ok. :)

1point

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My moms husbands mother (I know^^) is from finland, they've got a tradition, that little kids get one small present on the day before christmas. It's called Lille Jul - (little christmas). As a joke, he got my sister and I each a present when we were about 20 years old. This evolved into a tradition that we meet with my moms side of the family each year on the 23rd and celebrate Lille Jul, basically stretching christmas for one day longer. At one point we decided to skip this whole presents for everybody for christmas thing and just raffle one person each to gift a present. Over the years this resulted in having one present for christmas and a whole lot of presents for Lille Jul now. I'm nearly 40 now, so about 20 years. I LOVE this tradition.

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Final score:

9points

LuckyL

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Living in Australia, we don't have mistletoe, so each year I hang a 'mistle-toad' and we kiss under him!

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Final score:

8points

Elly Clifton

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hiding stockings so that you have to have a very quiet treasure hunt at the crack of dawn.

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Final score:

7points

Boootifull Unicorn

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Ozymann-k 11 months ago

the booty crack of dawn

1point

My sister and I exchange advent calenders that we stock ourselves in memory if our mom. I like to put little extras (like hand cream or scrunchies) in it for the 6th and 24th.

Ohhh...and our little plastic tree is named Joachim and I like to put it/him up at the end of november so we can enjoy it more.

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Final score:

7points

sturmwesen

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Frank Hayes 11 months ago

I send my sister advents in memory of our mom. When mom was alive she redone every December and was really fun with it. NO cheating was a hard rule, she savored each piece, talking about how wonderful it tasted and how thoughtful the advent is.

0points

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Our family has a nerf gun fight, even my 70+ year old mother gets involved. We have the best time.

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Final score:

7points

Jeanette Thompson

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I live in Australia and came from New Zealand, where it's summer at Christmas. We still do all the twinkly trees and Santa dressed up for the cold, plus roasts and brandy puddings despite it being 32C plus (or like 40C and over!). Christmas dinner though is as likely to be on the barbecue (keeps the heat outside) and feature lots of salads, fresh seafood, ice cold drinks and air conditioning. Quite a lot of people go to the beach or picnic on Christmas Day. Presents are given on the day, and only before if it's for workmates or neighbours.

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Final score:

6points

WordWeaver

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Huddo's sister 11 months ago

The surfing Santas are better though! Actually, they might be trumped by the tradition of Santas on fire trucks turning up to community events.

3points

Back when I was a kid, on our dairy farm, we always set up two Christmas trees - the big, standard "main tree" in the living room, and a smaller tree on a table in our enclosed front porch. This little tree had all homemade edible decorations. Mom would make several big dishpans of popcorn (popping in a cast iron skillet on our wood/coal stove) and make a pink sugar glaze to put on it. Then we'd take needle and thread and string the popcorn on it for garlands for the tree. More popcorn got homemade caramel and peanuts and made into popcorn balls for ornaments and hung on the tree. Plus candy canes and other edible goodies. Presents under the tree were small boxes of homemade Christmas cookies and candy. Guest, carol singers, etc., were all invited to get a 'present' and take some stuff to nibble from this tree. We also had a truly ancient set of heavy wax paper stencils of Christmas stuff that we would use with Glass Wax (colored with food coloring) and small damp sponges to decorate our windows and mirrors.

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Final score:

5points

Bill Swallow

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Sweet Taurus 11 months ago

I remember my Great Grandmother having a very small tree in her tiny living room and we would make popcorn garland for it. She would also save any type of Christmas themed papers from her daily paper and we would cut them out and glue them to cardboard to hang on the tree. It was so simple but so memorable.

0points

#10

We're pagan, but the rest of the family is Christian so we celebrate Yule and Christmas. But Yule, starting at sunset, we have a big bonfire, an outdoor feast and exchange small handmade gifts. We leave a small potion of the feast out as an offering and wake up early the next morning to watch the sunrise.
Christmas stuff, is, you know, generic Christmas stuff; stockings, presents, insanely over-buttered family dinner. We do have a Christmas Eve box with matching pajamas, a movie and snacks,

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Final score:

5points

Rae Rory

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Lene 11 months ago

Norse Pagan here :) I have this thing where I visit some of my ancestors' graves as close to Dec. 24th and I make an offering for/with them: we share a beer. :) it is so nice and peaceful and I am often left to the nice memories I have of my ancestors, while drinking and sharing. This year, I plan to have my kids join in (but with some apple juice or sometjing like that.). They already like to share meals with our nisse so I think that sharing a drink with an ancestor will be fun for them, as well. :)

0points

#11

my aunt and uncle bring their cats over :)

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Final score:

4points

Ozymann-k

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#12

Both Christmas and Thanksgiving. when i was a young woman, just learning to cook, my family gave me the odious chore of heating up a can of peas. I am sure they thought I couldn't possibly mess that up. well......the kids were running around, the pets were underfoot, all the older family members were 'in charge' of the dinner....so, I forgot the peas. forgot they were cooking, boiling away on the back burner. by the time someone noticed them, they were boiled down to green water with empty pea skins floating . it immediately became a family tradition, and i was asked at every holiday to 'make pea skins"....still making them, sometimes on purpose, sometimes by accident, over 50 years later!

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Final score:

4points