I love shopping for perfect gift (which I start in August) but I hate wrapping those gifts. I love the cocktail parties but I hate having the stand in cold houses in strappy shoes. I love the little twinkle lights but I hate when one light bulb goes out and the stand on the top of the tree blinks like bad night club.
But beyond all I love the traditions to the point I may have become a Victorian.
Christmas Cards
(Kate Spade - I found them at TJ Maxx last year and bought them all
and forgot where I put them for this year)
Christmas Cards have been around longer then Hallmark (not that Valentines Cards were either Geoffrey Chaucer mentioned them in the High Middle Ages) and this year I sent them in time to actually be enjoyed. The first Christmas cards were commissioned by Sir Henry Cole and illustrated by John Callcott Horsley in London on the 1st of May 1843. The central picture showed three generations of a family raising a toast to the card's recipient: on either side were scenes of charity, with food and clothing being given to the poor (see above). In 1874 the tradition came to America. Both World Wars brought cards with patriotic themes. Idiosyncratic "studio cards" with cartoon illustrations and sometimes risque humor caught on in the 1950s. The tradition is dying out faster then the thank you thanks to sites like paperless post. But there nothing like getting a Christmas Card from an old friend. (Dates and names from Wikipedia)
Mistletoe
plus
(apparently)
equals this
(Sadly no matter how much time I spend standing under the mistletoe
Mr. Cumberbatch has yet to show up)
Mistletoe and Norse Mythology
The Norse god Balder was one of the favorites (kinda like Thor in the movies). His mother was Frigga was the goddess of love and beauty. She loved her son so much that she went through the world, securing promises from the four elements that they would not harm her beloved Balder.
Loki (the internets favorite bad guy) made an arrow from Mistletoe wood. Using Balder's blind brothers hand, Loki directed the arrow at Balder's heart, and he fell dead.
Frigga's tears became the mistletoe's white berries and Balder is restored to life. Frigga is so grateful she makes the Mistletoe symbol of love and promising to bestow a kiss upon anyone who passes under it.
(pantheon.org)
The Christmas Tree
My favorite love story in history is Victoria and Albert.
Queen Victoria after marrying German Prince Albert gave us the Christmas we know today. In fact Prince Albert was instrumental in bringing German traditions to Britain.
An engraving of the Royal Family celebrating Christmas at Windsor was published in 1848 and their German traditions were adopted worldwide.
Kathryn Jones, is assistant curator of decorative arts at the Royal Collection...
"It has become the accepted way we celebrate Christmas now," she said.
"Queen Victoria's mother was German as well, so the Royal Family did have trees before Prince Albert popularised the Christmas tree. Queen Charlotte, used to bring yew trees in at Christmas. But for most people in Britain the idea of having a tree inside was completely new. People would bring in a branch of a tree or holly or mistletoe, but there wasn't that traditional Christmas scene that we know now." (BBC)
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