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| In order, DH, D, DD1, DD2, and mine. We got ours along with DD2 for her first Christmas. |
Saturn and Jupiter sights was as successful as our hunt to see the Northern Lights. There was just too much cloud cover, even going out 45 minutes past sunset which was supposed to be optimal. Still, I saw photos and video from the news and that was something, I guess. My excitement yesterday was getting the gifts wrapped and tucked under the tree. All are waiting under there for Christmas morning except the stockings, items of smallish value that are part fun, part treat, and part practical. I didn't grow up having a Christmas stocking. I'm not sure if not a Norwegian or Danish thing, so my mom never had that as part of her tradition, or if it was, with so many of us, it just fell by the wayside. I didn't have a certain stocking growing up like my kids all do, and I made sure DH and I have one as well. It's funny how I know bits of my Scandinavian heritage, but not so much from my mom.I think they were part of DH's, though of course he was an adult when we met, but I think I recall his younger siblings still getting one when they lived at home. Stockings weren't anything my bah humbug husband ever thought about when we had kids.
No, I was the one to make sure stockings are part of my families Christmas. Admittedly, some years I take great care to the stockings, and other years, it's sort of whatever Santa has left in the bottom of the sleigh that fits within the opening. Regardless, they are too heavy once filled, so come down from the fireplace mantle, and are layed with the present pile for the recipient. Another admission, I was insistent that our second house, the one likely to be the one (and was) that we raised our family in, had a fire place, and for stocking purposes. My mantel holds the five in our family very nicely so as we expand, I'll need to rethink how we hang them, but I'll want to share the tradition.
In my nod to my childhood of filled it Laura Ingalls Wilder and Little House on the Prairie, when Santa visits our house, the elf's try and remember to tuck an orange, some candy, and money in the stockings each year. Have you read it? Mr Edwards makes the long icy trek out to the Ingalls cabin, meeting Santa Claus along the way. As he tells the young girls, this fella with a long white beard dressed in red had asked their Pa's friend to help him deliver the girls stockings. They were thrilled with the sticking filled with a metal cup for drinking milk, a peppermint stick, 5 pieces of the Christmas ribbon candy, a little heart shaped a penny. The summary can be found here at Christmas in Pioneer America. The orange is not from that book but mentioned in multiple stories from the great depression and points in history as a symbol of good health and prosperity to come. Real Simple magazine did a nice summary a while back about Christmas oranges in stocking tradition. I just like how they look!
Even in my scaled back Christmas there is much more under the tree and will be put in stockings than a few hard candies,a cup and a penny. The real gifts even for those little girls over a 125 years ago wasn't what was in the stocking at all, but the generosity of their Pa's friend who risked the elements to make their day special. Maybe we can get the feeling back in Christmases to come that the real gifts aren't hanging on the mantel but being able to be with family and friends.
The stocking is my favorite part of the gift giving.
ReplyDeleteIt is a fun tradition-little surprises, little practical things-love it as well.
DeleteMy mother used to lay the stockings at the head of our beds or hang them on the bedpost while we were sleeping. It was brilliant, because rather than run downstairs at the crack of dawn and wake up the entire house, we younger ones would stay in bed and go through our stockings in private and silence in our rooms. I continued this tradition with my kids, hoping it would gain me some extra sleep on Christmas morning. My kids, however, when they were younger, insisted on charging into our rooms with the stockings, and emptying them at the foot of our bed. Now, that they are older, I still put the stockings in their room (usually at o'dark'thirty on Christmas morning) but they insist on going through them in the living room near the tree.
ReplyDeleteyour mom was a smart cookie! I laughed when I read your kids just brought them to you anyway!
DeleteWhen I was growing up my mother always put an apple, an orange and hard candy in my stocking because that's what she always had in hers growing up during the depression. I did stockings some years for my kids but not always. These days we sometimes do secret Santa stockings. It's always fun no matter what. Like you said, the real gift is spending time those we love.
ReplyDeleteI feel bad no stocking for my son to fill, but he got a box of sweets and treats. I want to keep this tradition for as long as I can-next generation included.
DeleteMy dad used to get a penny and a clementine and thought that was wonderful (they were VERY poor). And talking of mantels, Jordan asked where the car key were once and I said "over there on the on the mantel" so he walked back into the living room, thought for a minute and said "what's a mantel"? It never occurred to me that he had never heard that word!
ReplyDeleteI often use words my kids think they've never heard of. I love that he didn't know mantel, but being bilingual, that is probably understandable.
DeleteI read the book, and we had oranges, too! I had the same stocking all my life.
ReplyDeleteThat's sweet that you have your childhood stocking.
DeleteI think oranges were such a luxury in the dead of Winter(unless you lived somewhere warm or where they grew year round). My mom(who grew up during the Depression)use to get oranges, peppermint candies and shelled nuts in her stocking. We kids got a orange, candy, chocolate and socks in ours growing up.
ReplyDeleteThe smell of an orange on Christmas morning is so wonderful as well. My mom was the queen of socks as gifts each year.
DeleteLovely post! I love that story from Little House on the Prairie.
ReplyDeleteOur stockings hang on the banister going upstairs since we have gas logs. We put an orange and candy and small things like fuzzy socks and teas and beef jerky etc.
I have a whole slew of knitted stockings I put on the bannister as well, but as decorations, not for purpose, though they could be.
DeleteMy son has a Santa stocking and my daughter a reindeer. I honestly think I bought them from Target’s dollar spot years ago but they look like they cost much more. Each has a filigree and crystal ornament with their first initial hanging from the loop. I have them on the railing that leads upstairs with green garland and sparkly red and green ornaments in between. Once I fill them, I just lay them on the floor since they would be too heavy to stay up. I don’t put fruit in them, I didn’t grow up with that tradition either, but they do get a chocolate orange, the kind you whack on the table and it breaks into sections and other little treats and things. I loved the Little House series and other books set in those times. JoAnn
ReplyDeleteMy youngest and mine and DHs came from Target in Christmas clearance in 2000 before she was born in January 2001, so this is the 20th year I have had a full mantel. I'd do the cholate orange but DD1 of course does not eat milk chocolate, and DD2 doesn't like chocolate orange. Last few years I've stuck bars of Aldi choclate,and they loved them.
DeleteI enjoyed this.
ReplyDeleteMother made the older children stockings, I still have mine. what a treasure.
She usually filled them (for they were large) with toiletries. I still have heaps of unopened tissues wrapped in plastic.
One year I found Minnesota Twins plastic wrapped tissues and put them in the kidds stockings. I think they are probably all still wrapped!
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