Its this time of year for my part of the world,
Thanksgiving & Christmas…
so I am curious one more time, what holidays do you celebrate? Valentine? new year? I’d like to know. sure I could google it, But I have my"encyclopedia" right here, what better way to get to know you!
Its a small world after all
wish I could find the music notes!!
In the Netherlands, we don´t celebrate Thanksgiving, but we do celebrate Christmas. And here we have two official days of Christmas, Eerste Kerstdag & Tweede Kerstdag (First day of Christmas & Second day of Christmas). How it is celebrated differs from family to family. However, it’s mostly about being together with the family, eating delicious food, listening to Christmas songs. Some families also exchange Christmas gifts and/or attend a church service on Christmas day.
Now another holiday we celebrate in December is Sinterklaas. The holiday is on December 6th. Sinterklaas has similarities with Santa Claus because they both bring presents for the children, but Sinterklaas traditionally comes from Spain to the Netherlands on a big steam boat.
It’s also a fun holiday for the adults to give presents to each other. Usually a small group of friends and/or family members come together and draw lots with the name of a person written on it. They then buy present(s) for that person that he/she has requested and hide the presents in a self-made surprise (this has the French pronunciation) together with a poem supposedly written by Sinterklaas himself. Here you can find examples of surprises: https://www.google.nl/search?dcr=0&tbm=isch&q=sinterklaas+surprise&spell=1&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjJtZff88XXAhVC2xoKHS2tDn8QBQg4KAA&biw=1536&bih=759&dpr=1.25
some of the people in the USA does celebrate “old Christmas” January 6, this was handed down to me on my quaker origin, I also have heard of the Sinteklass, and some of my ancestors came from your part of the world. yes gift giving and family gatherings were and some still are gathering. so good to know!! thank you for the link, ( doesn’t the older version of miracle on 34th street sing that??)
we in Germany celebrate xmas too. Heilig Abwned (24.12.), erster Weihnachtsfeiertag (25.12.) und zweiter Feiertag (26.12.).
and from family to Family it’s different. my fam and i dont go to church, others go. but these days are the typical familye time Holidays. i always hope to enjoy them like eastern and Pentecost/ whitsun.
my Family and i eat Kartoffelsalat (not me) and Wienerwürstchen or Bockwurst xD
♫♫
There you have the music notes copy and paste.
January 6 in my Island (Puerto Rico) is the 3 wise men day and gifts are given to children only (no adults). The real meaning of this day to mark the day they found JESUSCHRIST our LORD and SAVIOR born in a manger.We call it DIA DE LOS REYES MAGOS.
We as kids put green grass for the camels to eat during the night of January 5th. On January 6th when we wake up in the morning we find the box with grass gone, and the gift in there instead.
Very few in PR my island celebrate DECEMBER 25th and give gift on that day. If the person lived in US, they will keep that tradition of gift giving too when they move back into the island but is rare we get gift on December 25th. just January 6th.
I don’t celebrate Thanksgiving bc we chose to go ‘‘blackfriday’’ shopping and get great bargains and get gifts for family at a cheaper price.
I haven’t celebrated Christmas for a while bc my daughter has been very ill and just recently she’s making some improvements and she’s looking forward to her blackfriday shopping. I know we won’t stay too long since she gets extremely tired but at least is something she LOVES to do.
I believe Christmas should be more as a religious symbol but man always manage to make money from it. SANTA was done to take the religious image of JESUSCHRIST birth if you look at SANTA and change the spelling we can say is SATAN full of lies created a SANTA image to take our eyes away from the SON OF GOD who came to the world for ur salvation. Instead we get a santa that makes us shop, shop shop, til we drop lol.
NOW, don’t think I’m trying to put any ideas on anyone. That’s my belief and conclusions. If you think more about it, EASTER SUNDAY is to celebrate the resurrection of CHRIST from the cross but low and behold they make a bunny and easter eggs and gifts and we lose the real meaning of Easter Sunday and we put our eyes on the bunny and forget to thank JESUSCHRIST for his sacrifice.
I know… I know, that’s a Christian belief and it was the way I was brought up. We chose what we want to believe in and what we want to celebrate or not. Oddly enough, I give gift and celebrated christmas but we also visit the church. That’s me. I try to balance things well by explaining to my kids the christian way but I also don’t deny them the happiness of opening gifts just because I know the purpose of the creation of santa mind you, check out his name very cleverly disguised.
I think that we have/grow in our hearts it’s so much more important. It has to be full good deeds, love for one another, but of course this imperfect human gets angry knows bad words–(curses) and oops I have sinned more than I wished I did hahahaha. Sorry for my weakness and imperfections, but if I was perfect I know I wouldn’t belong into this imperfect world or would be ‘‘down here’’. I don’t think I’m that bad either (don’t need to be reminded how many times I was …
sorry…)
teufelchen_netty_266
those names were a mouthful, there’s another dish my family made as well, not sure if it was for the holidays unless its what you mentioned wienerwustchen /wienersnichel&saurekraut? don’t know if I spelled that right, but oh so good! yeah some of my family originated in Germany.
day of the magi or old Christmas, yes I have heard of that one
and you are so right! Christmas is more commercialism than Christian, really a pity there. and just what you said, think that we have/grow in our hearts it’s so much more important. It has to be full good deeds, love for one another
so we ain’t all perfect, yes we are to give, spread love show people who Jesus Christ is. I am not preaching and please forgive me if it sounds like it, I am just responding to what you said.
we aren’t all perfect, and we sinned, but He took it away from us, our sins were nailed to that cross
there was only one perfect person and they nailed him to the cross
weaknesses and our imperfections make us stronger in Him. hey at my young age of 71, been there done that, I will stop now. sorry, but just felt like I had to mention this to you
♫♫Jesus is the season♫♫ oh and thank you for the notes.
@marygrether1_gmail_c
Yes, HE is the reason for the season. Thank you.
By the way, if you press the CTRL Key at the same time with the J, the music notes come out perfectly. It works for me, but I heard some ppl complain it doesn’t work for them. Enjoy your Holidays.
What I find strange… In my country (The Netherlands) we don’t celebrate Thanksgiving but more and more shops do have black friday sales?! First I was like well that’s early because I first thought black friday was a day after christmas. No idea where I got that idea from to be honest but later I was like no that is related to Thanksgiving.
Won’t be surprised if someday we miht celebrate it too because more people start to celebrate Halloween here too.
If the sales are supposed to be cheap on that black Friday, why don’t the places do it every day? Guess that’s a catch-all. I don’t shop on that Friday…
Sauerkraut and wiener schnitzel isn’t typical for Christmas.
it’s normal stuff for every day, unlike Holiday xD
ok, thanks… and here is some of the cooking in the south some like the turkey, maybe mashed potatoes & gravy, biscuits, cranberry salad ,greens like collards or a big salad some do make pastry these are thinner than dumplings. also desert a variety, sweet potato pie, pumpkin pie, pecan pie, cake of all sorts, sometimes ice cream on top. the usual tea or coffee.
whoever does celebrate thanksgiving, have a great day tomorrow and be blessed
In Germany Halloween is coming, more and more. Children are demanding “trick or treat” and in the last few years I have sweets at home for them.
In my region, I live in a little town near the former capital “Bonn”, we have the tradition of “Sankt Martin” and kindergarten & schools hold St. Martin’s processions with self-made laterns. So beautiful! And after, each child will get a special kind of sweet bun, called “Weckmann” it looks like a man. And they go from house to house, singing songs about St. Martin and the people reward them with sweets.
I’m from Germany, too 
We celebrate not only Christmas, but the 4 weeks before. Children get an “Adventskalender”, this is a calendar with sweets and little presents, from the 1st to 24th December. You can buy it with chocolate, open each day a door and get your reward. Some are homemade, filled with sweets or presents. Families count the days and celebrate the 4 sundays before Christmas as “Adventssonntag” and gather for a special “tea time” with special christmas sweets like ginger bread, cookies and fruit or marzipan cakes.
Often families bake those Christmas Cookies together, often they have their own, old and well kept recipes. They decorate the houses and most families have a Christmas Tree.
We celebrate Christmas on 3 days. The Christmas Eve, 24.12. where some families go to church. Usually we have a delicious dinner and the families celebrate together. My family has every year oven-made goose drumsticks with potatoe dumplings and thin sliced red cabbage. We listen to christmas songs and after dinner we give each other presents. I love this peaceful atmosphere with my family.
On the first and second christmas day families celebrate together as well or just enjoy some free time. Traditional christmas dishes are gooses, ducks, turkey, sometimes deer or goar with nice side dishes. Some families keep it simple and enjoy potatoe salad with sausages.
These are homemade gingerbread cookies from last year
Those look so good! I The little reindeer are so cute I’ll have to look for that cookie cutter for this Christmas.
I just heard about Black Friday today from my mom in Switzerland, I was laughing hard, why…
Since Im in US it’s all about commercial holidays that involves “shopping” I think it’s not much about tradition itself but tradition “shop till your drop” and eat and drink a lot…
It starts with Valentines’ Day, then Easter, Memorial Day, 4th July, Labor Day, Halloween, Thankgsgiving, Christmas and as last New Year’s Eve. The stores are full of theme colored and occasion selected kitchen gadgets/paper plates, table ware, napkins, table cloths candles… cards, deco and Special Sale for all kinds of products and even cars. Weeks before Halloween night I see X-Mas deco in stores…
Now Thanksgiving is one the most important push to meet sales budget… all stores compete for the best products and discounts, Black Friday, people used to line up 5 am in front of BestBuy an electronic store… not sure if they still do that… anyway then comes Monday which is Cyber Monday special sale for electronics, smart phones, don’t we need another new one 
It seems these sales practice has been transferred to European Markets as well; business thrives when people buy stuff… but where the old stuff ends that is not so much discussed… Several years or a decade ago the Halloween custom has been transferred to Europe too…
Thanksgiving has many origins or roots, it began as a day of giving thanks for the blessing of the harvest, it is also connected to religious traditions in November, it is celebrated in various countries: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thanksgiving
I think I still like the Christmas traditions of Christmas carols, the smell of a pine tree, candles, clementines and many varieties of Christmas cookies (home baked). It starts with the Advent wreath lightning each Sunday a candle.
I like going to Christmas Mass, more for the choral singing, music and singing Christmas carols, not so much what they talk about. When going to church I have time to just sit and think, it’s kinda peaceful.
I think when you have children it’s more fun to celebrate Christmas as you get older the value of putting time of decorating house and tree somehow fades away. 
- Fondest tradition is baking cookies with family, sometimes past midnight and retelling stories while drinking wine or schnaps
Wishing everyone a blessed holiday season 
http://www.slovakcooking.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/xmas-cookies1-300x225.jpg
http://img.radio.cz/pictures/vanoce/vanocka2.jpg
@sim11 talking about Black Friday this was the best deal in years! they had a 55 inch smart TV for $298 since my car is small, I couldn’t buy it (a cab would cost about $150) I didn’t really need the TV i already have one but that was such an awesome deal. At least, I got me a Laptop since this one was falling in pieces lol I drop them a lot (I’m too clumsy) I bought a digital sewing machine for only $89 dollars! A christmas (6 feet) three Original $50 dollars for $15.
Since I had rewards points, the christmas tree was free. My daughter who is feeling so much better, decorated the tree mostly by herself while i cooked dinner. this black friday was not chaotic, but pretty relaxing, ppl were nice and we chat as we waited in line to get in the store. I’m looking forward to Cyber Monday for my christmas gifts shopping. Let’s see if it turns out great too. Wish me luck!
I know you can find great deals if you know what you need… sometimes good deals makes you want to buy it just because it’s a good price, but does one really need it… I need a new laptop as well my 2012 acer screen is just hanging on one hinge the other broke I used tape but even that isn’t sticking to the narrow plastic screen surround
and using external keyboard since the acer chicklets just come off so easily… had I known… (also TG deal then) I won’t get a refurbished!
Good luck finding your deal!! 
I’m happy to hear your daughter is doing better 
Btw noticed how some screens have a really bad resolution on the letters, I can see the screen lines(they are cost saving screens), some are better like the iphone crispy graphic you can’t see that on a picture when you shop… I have to go back to walmart I saw only 1 dell and 1 hp with the great graphic and Im no fan of W10
That’s where I got my HP (Walmart bc Bestbuy had not one) My daughter was the one who picked the laptop so i’m confident is a good one (this is the first time buying a laptop there)… I know nothing about laptops/electronics so they make all the decisions (either my son or my daughter I mean) lol
What are the odds? My laptop is hanging by the hinge too! I haven’t opened the new one yet bc I’m doing my christmas decoration in my apartment. I’m so happy my daughter is doing so much better I have the energy to look forward to this christmas.
Thanks for all the good wishes. I hope you find what you want CYBER MONDAY it’s a great day to save too. Make sure a second after midnight tonight Sunday, you are looking for the bargains for great products! The best of luck…