Events in our lives shape these traditions.  I use to make a popcorn garland for my tree every year but now, with my beagle, my tree would be destroyed if I dressed my tree up in her favorite treat.

I always find traditions fascinating.  Staying up until midnight, popping the bubbly, and ringing in the New Year.  Sharing a kiss, sometimes with a stranger, the first kiss of a new year.  Some people stay up all night and greet the sunrise.

Did you know that the most commonly sung song by English-speakers on New Year’s Eve – and also the song that almost no one knows the actual lyrics to – is Auld Lang Syne by Robert Burns in 1796?

Robert says that he refined the lyrics after hearing an old man in Ayrshire, Scotland singing it.  Auld Lang Syne literally means “old long since” and means “time gone by.”  The song asked if old friends and times will be forgotten and promises to remember people of the past with fondness.  ”For auld lang syne, we’ll tak a cup o’kindness yet.”

Traditions are everywhere and different all over the world.

In Britain, they celebrate with First Footing – this was someone special who would come to your house baring gifts.  People hit the streets at midnight, visiting houses.  Usually, you would be visited by a neighbor who would bring coal for the fire or shortbread.  It was considered especially lucky if the first visitor to your home on the New Year was a tall, dark, handsome man.

The Dutch actually burn Christmas trees in the street on New Year’s night.  They, its a great way to make sure you get rid of your tree for the coming year, right?

Over in Spain, to insure twelve prosperous months, they eat twelve grapes at midnight.  While in Greece, they bake Vassilopitta – or St. Basil cakes.  This is a cake with a gold coin baked inside.  Whoever gets the coin will be especially lucky that year.

New Year’s is the most important holiday in Japan as it is a symbol of renewal.  They hold Forget-the-Year parties all through December to bid farewell to the problems of the past year and prepare for a new beginning.  Grudges and misunderstandings are forgiven and major cleaning is done to the house.  It is said to be very bad luck to start the year off in a dirty house.

At midnight on New Year’s Eve, Buddhist temples strike their gongs 108 times to expel 108 types of human weakness.

On New Year’s day, no work is done.  A day of joy, children recieve small gifts with money inside.  Sending New Year’s cards is a very popular tradition in Japan.  In fact, if it is postmarked by a certain date, the post office guarantees delivery of all New Year’s cards by New Year’s Day.

Then you have the various American traditions.  Watching New York’s ball drop – we also have the Peach Drop here in Georgia.  The New Year’s Ball in Time Square actually started in 1907.  Back then, the ball was made of iron and wood.  Now its made of Waterford crystal.

I didn’t really watch the ball or Peach drop until I was much older.  Even now, its rarely on my television.  Probably because I didn’t grow up with it.

My tradition came because of my situation with my parents.  They divorced when I very young, not even two yet.  As I grew older, I would spend Christmas with my mother and New Year’s with my father.  This means that my dad and his girlfriend would be passed out drunk before ten and my little brother fell asleep watching some movie.

I’d stay up late, curled up on the couch with a soda and a book, reading until I heard the neighbors shooting off fireworks.  Looking up, I would see it was a few minutes passed midnight and everyone in the house was sleeping.

Getting up, I’d so out on the porch, freezing cold and clutching my paperback and I’d watch the fireworks the neighbors were shooting off.  This was in Alabama, too, so they were really good fireworks.

Its funny because fireworks and noise makers are in most New Year’s traditions.  It goes back to ancient times when people thought that fire and loud noises would keep evil away.

My father-in-law, in fact, rings a giant bell that hangs outside in his yard every year at midnight.

When I got older and started staying in Georgia to ring in the New Year, I did go to my share of New Year’s Eve parties.  But I find now that I am married with a home, I am content to spend New Year’s at home, curled up with a good book and drinking pink champagne as my husband plays video games.

This year’s reading choice:  Last Chance to Run by Dianna Love.

While that might seem boring or sad to some people, honestly, I love having that time to dive into a great story.  Do I feel like I missed out sometimes because everyone else was sleeping?  I used to but not so much anymore.  I had my own tradition, even if it wasn’t a common one and now its one I take comfort in.

New Year’s day we’d come home from Daddy’s and my mom would fix collards and black eyed peas and to this day, I go to my mom’s New Year’s day for just that meal.  After all, collards brings dollars and peas bring pennies for the coming year.  Its important to eat lots of them. hehe

What are your traditions?  Do you have any non-traditional traditions of your very own or are you our partying until the sun comes up?  Share with me and you could win your own, brand new copy of Last Chance to Run - the very book I ran in 2013 with just a few days ago.  A fabulous Romantic Thriller autographed by Dianna Love herself.  It’ll be personalized with the winner’s name and believe me, this is one fun and riveting read.

And I just want to take a moment to thank Dianna for her donation.  I’ve been enjoying this book and was thrilled when she agreed to give away a signed copy of it on our blog today.

Oh, and for anyone out there even a little curious about what they’re singing when the clock strikes midnight:

 Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
And never brought to mind?
Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
And auld lang syne.

For auld lang syne, my dear
For auld lang syne,
We’ll tak a cup of kindness yet,
For auld lang syne!

And surely ye’ll be your pint-stowp,
And surly I’ll be mine,
And we’ll tak a cup o’ kindness yet,
For auld lang syne!

For auld lang syne, my dear
For auld lang syne,
We’ll tak a cup of kindness yet,
For auld lang syne!

We  twa hae run about the braes,
And pou’d the gowans fine,
But we’ve wander’d monie a weary fit,
Sin auld lang syne.

 For auld lang syne, my dear
For auld lang syne,
We’ll tak a cup of kindness yet,
For auld lang syne!

We twa hae paidl’d in the burn,
Frae morning sun till dine,
But seas between us braid hae roar’d
Sin auld lang syne.

 For auld lang syne, my dear
For auld lang syne,
We’ll tak a cup of kindness yet,
For auld lang syne!

And there’s a hand my trusty fiere,
And gie’s a hand o thine,
And we’ll tak a right guid-willie waught,
For auld lang syne.

 For auld lang syne, my dear
For auld lang syne,
We’ll tak a cup of kindness yet,
For auld lang syne!

As an exercise in fun, I thought I’d put together Christmas titles of holiday songs to make a story. Have any to add?

It’s Christmas?, I’ll Be Home For Christmas, Over The River and Through the Woods, Sleigh Ride, in a Winter Wonderland, Baby, It’s Cold Outside, All I Want for Christmas Is You, We Need A Little Christmas, Deck the Halls, with The Holly and the Ivy, It’s Beginning to Look A Lot Like Christmas, Welcome Christmas, Twas the Night Before Christmas, Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Up On The Rooftop, Do You Hear What I Hear?, Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer, and Here Comes Santa Claus, have A Holly Jolly Christmas, Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree, It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year, We Wish You A Merry Christmas, What Are You Doing New Year’s Eve

How about you? Any important or memorable Christmas or Hanukah Songs? Or if you’d rather, see how many holiday songs you can string together. I’m giving away a Mikasa crystal candy dish filled with chocolate to one Merry Music Maker who comments.

Wishing each of you and your family a blessed and joyous Holiday Season filled with love and laughter. And a new year full of health and happiness.

Tamales are said to have originated in Mesoamerica as early as 5000 BCE. They derive their name from the Nahuatl word “tamalii” which means “wrapped food.” The people of the Sierra Madre Mountains of Mexico hybridized wild grasses to produce what we know today as corn (thank you, Mexico.) It eventually gained significance in the region as a sacred plant and the main source of food in Meso-American civilizations, particularly the Aztec and Maya civilizations. The Aztec and Maya, as well as the Olmeca and Tolteneca before them, used tamales as a portable food for feeding their armies, but hunters and travelers used them as well.

The making and consumption of tamales was well established by the 16th century in the Aztec empire, around which time the Spanish conqueror and explorer Hernan Cortes (c. 1485-1541) arrived in that section of the New World presently known today as Mexico (which includes a large portion of our Southwestern United States.) Franciscan Friar Bernardino de Sahagun (c. 1499-1590) mentioned tamales in his 12-volume history series on the Aztec civilization, “Historia General de las Cosas de Nueva Espana” (“General History of the Things in New Spain”). The Spanish spread the use of the tamal throughout their other colonies and in Spain after returning to their home country (along with corn seeds.)

A tamal (singular) is made of masa and steamed or boiled in a leaf wrapper (banana in some regional areas of Latin America, corn husk in New Mexico and other Mexican-American areas of the United States.) The wrapping is discarded before eating (former President Gerald Ford, who wasn’t made aware of this well-known-to-tamale-eaters-everywhere fact, when asked what the great lesson of his 1976 election defeat to Jimmy Carter was, he answered, “Always shuck your tamales.”)

For years, the preparation and eating of tamales, known as the tamalada, was as much a Christmas family ritual for Mexican-American families as cutting down and decorating the Christmas tree, or making bizcochitos, a traditional anise and cinnamon-flavored Christmas cookie. While I have tried my hand at making bizcochitos over the years, making homemade tamales was a rite of passage for young girls in our family that has gone by the wayside for me, since it is rare I am with my family the days before Christmas Eve, when the tamale-making is at its peak. You do NOT want to attempt this feat alone!

‘’I think of it as the theology of la tamalada,’’ said Roberto Piña, program coordinator for the Mexican-American Cultural Center in San Antonio, Texas. ‘’It’s a process that begins with making the tamales, but ends up being a sharing of what’s gone on over the past year. It’s not just about making tamales. It’s a way of coming together, sharing and rejoicing.’’

Making homemade tamales, which can easily take eight hours, is definitely on the decline. But people still eat them at the meal following Midnight Mass and throughout the holiday season. They bring them to gatherings the way people elsewhere might bring fruitcakes. This Christmas I have promised myself that I will gather my daughter, daughter-in-law, hopefully-daughter-in-law-to-be, and close friends for an afternoon of tamale-making!

If you’re in the mood for making new traditions with your daughters, sisters or friends this Christmas, I’ve included a humorous account of my family’s tamales recipe on my personal blogspot, Chai Tea and Chocolate, where I’ve collected several tried-and-true family recipes. Gather four to ten “sisters” for a fun day of tamale-making! Everyone brings an appetizer to share and you offer to make the margaritas!

Are you a tamales connoisseur? If so, what are your favorites? Do you have Christmas family traditions you wish you’d kept to pass on to your children?

October is one of my favorite months.  I love the cool feel of fall in the air, the crisp sound of the leaves as they start turning brittle, the smell of yummy pies and cookies baking in the oven.  October is also host to one of my favorite holidays.  Halloween.

As a kid, I remember my dad holding my hand as I stumbled down the street dressed in a cheesy Woody Woodpecker costume complete with the fake plastic mask that didn’t allow children to see where they were walking, much less breath.  This ritual was heaven on earth for me.  Not only was I getting to play “dress up”, but I had permission from my parents to knock on strangers’ doors and take candy from them.  For young children, this in itself is so taboo that to be told I had permission to do it was almost as good as eating the candy I collected.  Almost.

I often wondered where some of these strange customs came from.  Whose crazy idea was it to encourage kids to hunt from house to house for candy?  Why dress up at all? 

As I did some research on the topic, I thought I’d share a few of the facts I found with you.  After all, our readers are Tick-or-Treaters’ in a sense when they hunt for daily treats on the various blogs… Thanks to Wikipedia and other articles on the Internet, this is what I found.

1)      The great thing about this world we live in is that no matter where we are, we get to experience some of the wonderful cultures of other countries.  Historians have linked Halloween with a number of the strange Halloween customs we practice today.  For instance, the more common association of Halloween is the Celtic festival of Samhain.  Samhain comes from the Old Irish and denotes the end of summer.

2)      The ancient Celts also believed that Samhain was the day when the border between our world and the spirit world became thin, allowing spirits to enter our world.  Of course they would welcome the spirits of their ancestors, but not so much a visit from a bad spirit. Their solution was to dress up as bad spirits in costumes and masks to scare away those unwanted spirits and hopefully avoid harm.

3)      The word Halloween is first mentioned in the early 16^th century and up through the early 20^th century.  Here the Scottish used a shortened version of the phrase “All-Hallows-Even,” which was used to represent the night before All Hallows Day.

4)      The Jack-O-Lantern evolved over time encompassing customs of medieval holy days and contemporary cultures.  Candle lanterns were first carved out of turnips as a way “commemorate the souls in purgatory.”  These carvings were also placed in windows and used to ward off evil spirits.  The switch to using pumpkins in North America was because they allowed for larger carvings and the pumpkins were easier to carve and there were more of them to use.

5)      We have the Middle Ages to thank for Trick-or-Treating.  Way back it was called Christmas wassailing or souling.  It originated in Ireland and Britain when the poor would go from house to house on Hallowmas (November 1^st) and receive food in return for their prayers for the dead on All Souls Day, which was November 2^nd.  It was the Scottish and Irish immigrants who brought the custom to North America in the 19^th century.

6)      The first mass-produced costume appeared in stores in the 1930s.  This was when trick-or-treating really became popular in the US.  Still, it was the mention of the holiday in several children’s magazines in the 1940s that really made this day explode. 

7)      Food is a huge part of this holiday, almost as much as for Thanksgiving and Christmas.  This can be likened to the fact that the holiday comes around the time of the annual apple harvests.  I’m extremely happy about this because caramel apples, candy apples and taffy apples are among my very favorite foods.  Unfortunately, the custom of giving out candy apples to trick-or-treaters has lost its appeal due to the rumors of terrible people poisoning or embedding razor blades in the apples.  Although there are reports of this type of thing around the world, they are very rare and only a few deaths or serious injuries have resulted from this and other poisonings (information summarized from Wikipedia and various news articles).  One really sad incident was the case of a father who poisoned his own son’s candy as a way to collect the life insurance money.

8)      One other food custom I found particularly fun was the modern-day Irish barmbrack.  This is described as a light fruitcake where small trinkets are baked inside.  One custom says that if you get a ring in your slice, you will find your true love in the following year.  I don’t really need the ring custom, but I might incorporate the baking of this bread into my own Halloween customs this year.

9)      I wasn’t surprised to see that Halloween was not celebrated all over the world, but I did like the idea that the way the United States and Canada celebrates the holiday has had a tremendous effect and has extended to other countries.   I was surprised to see that although there is a very diverse Christian attitude towards the holiday, various faiths celebrate different versions of the day.  Some of those include All Saints’ Day, Reformation Day and other churches have even created their own forms of parties and events to encourage people to participate in a safe manner.

10)  Halloween can be whatever a person wants to make of the day.  There were numerous articles on how this has become a huge profit leader for the retail world.  Some say it is completely commercialized.  Others say it is extortion.  I read where adults participate only as a way to keep mischievous kids from vandalizing property and I read an article where there were children protesting the traditions of the holiday.  Of all the holidays, this one is bound to bring out strong opinions, either good or bad.

For me, Halloween is a reminder that summer is gone, the weather is turning, and life is about to slow down.  I find myself stocking up on reading material, perusing my cookbooks for comfort foods, and anticipating the chance to start my first fire in the fire pit.  Of course, I’ve also decorated my house with cobwebs draped over the doorways and skeletons peaking out of the flowerbeds in anticipation of the Trick-or-Treaters I know will come.  I’ll pass out candy to the younger kids, tease the older ones until they show me a trick, and enjoy the sticky mess of my caramel apples.  For me, THIS is Halloween.

How about you?  What does Halloween represent for you?  Any fun traditions I left out of my research?