As a Hungarian American one of our traditions is baking Kiffles with Lekvar. For those who may not know these are Christmas cookies. It is a crescent shaped light flaky cream cheese pastry filled with plum/prune butter and sprinkled with sugar. Delicious!!! Merry Christmas 🎄🎁 to you…
In Denmark santa gets rice porridge, it's important to keep a varied diet, and with every country doing something different we're keeping santa healthy...
At our house Santa got chocolate covered cherries and a Bud Light. Dad had terrible taste in beer, lol. We also left carrots and apples for the reindeer.
@@TheBarkinFrogLow rent cookies (such as Lorna Doones 🤢🤮) for Santa, a carrot for Rudolph & Co. I loved to examine the carrot stub for tell-tale teeth (love alliteration) marks. This was before checking out what Santa left. Always believed reindeer were the true heroes of Christmas Eve.
I’m English and we were allowed to open one Christmas gift (but only a small one!), on Christmas Eve, after we had walked home through the village from Midnight Mass. Also, we never had our gifts placed under the tree, we had a sack full of gifts left by Santa at the end of our beds and we would carry our sacks down stairs to open them around the tree together. This will be my 56th and last UK Christmas. Merry Christmas to everyone.
Watching this in July, since I just discovered this channel recently. I love our family's tradition - bear with me, I'll try to make it as short as I can. First, my mother, rest her soul, couldn't bear the thought of anyone alone at Christmas so she started a tradition of inviting people over on Christmas eve that normally would be alone, and then it morphed into more and more people - there were some years we would have 50 people, and our house is not huge. Every room in the house was decorated for Christmas, even the bathrooms, and the outside as well. Christmas eve was spent all day cooking and polishing. In the evening, we would have a feast of turkey, pork roast, ham, sometimes roast beef, plus all the veg and salads and side dishes. Everyone that came to the party usually brought a dessert, so we would have a TON of desserts. And my mom made a fabulous punch (non-alcoholic). Before eating, someone would say grace and after eating, we would gather in one room for a big White Elephant/Yankee Swap gift exchange. Before the gift exchange, we would sing a few Christmas carols and someone would read the nativity story from the Bible, out of Luke 2. Then, one by one, each person would have a turn (if they chose) to say something; usually, it was a chance to give thanks for blessings in our lives. After that, we had the gift exchange. They were hilarious and the party usually wouldn't break up until after midnight. My family would stay up, putting food in the fridge and cleaning up and putting out the stockings by the fireplace before finally falling into bed. Early the next morning, everyone comes over and my sister would bring over a big pot of Russian tea and we sip it and coffee and pastries and everyone opens their presents. For our meal, we would have leftovers from the feast the night before. The whole day is spent opening presents, eating and laughing. I wouldn't trade the world for our traditions and for the memories I have of them. (Sorry this was so long.)
I think of all the traditions that was the best. My family was large. The've all scattered to different states. This year we, being Mexican-American, i spent 3 days making beef tamales. They were wonderful!
Bless your dear sweet mama's heart. I worked at a HUGE law firm in Los Angeles. Many of the staff were single and had NO family near L.A. The Personnel Director, actually invited ALL of them to her house for Thanksgiving and Christmas and Easter!!!
My daughter is twenty two years old. I still fill a stocking for her. Everyone gets a Christmas stocking when they visit us Christmas Day. I have actually bought extra items just for this purpose. When my daughter was younger, she had pet Guinea pigs. She insisted that they be included. We still have the tiny stockings. Rachel filled them with carrots for her "babies ". Another tradition in our home is the decorating. We trim the tree ( and shamelessly over decorate most flat surfaces) in time for the first Sunday in Advent. Christmas activities last until Epiphany.
Just remembered the plum pudding with hot custard my (English) mother used to make every Christmas and it unexpectedly made me tear up. May she rest in peace.
My old mum used to put a generous slosh of either brandy or sherry into the custard for the pudding. (Hic!) By the way, what the 12th Doctor said about the last thing in a stocking. It's true, nobody likes the satsuma. 😁
My Army father was stationed in the Netherlands when I was small. Every year we had three Christmases:1) the Dutch Christmas when we got candy in our shoes, 2) the traditional American Christmas with gifts mostly ordered from Sears in the US, and 3) the "stuff that came late from Sears Christmas" when my parents got the last of the orders from Sears and wrapped them up and hid them around so it looked like Santa might have dropped it when he was here on the 25th. One year my mom pulled a package out from behind the couch. "Look," she said. "Santa must have dropped this. It has your name on it" I asked her why my name was in her handwriting and she explained, :Santa was running late, so he asked me to write your name on it." It sounded right to me!
My Mom did that with the wrapping paper too. She said that to save time, Santa had given all our gifts to her directly and asked her to wrap them for him. I sort of believed her..
@@jeandiatasmith4512 As children it was a really cute Christmas nightgown or pajamas. As adults it's usually something we just can't wait to give another member in the family. Or funny pajamas.
As an Austrian we surprisingly don't watch the sound of music (I have never seen that movie although the story is based in Austria 🙈), we go to church in the afternoon before Christmas eve, then open all the presents. Those are brought not by Santa, but by "Christkind" who is basically a golden angel, and after that we go to church again at midnight.
My understanding is that the von Trapp family was very unpopular in Austria, because they basically ran out on their country when things started going downhill, while everybody else stuck it out.
@@JohnDoe-fu6zt If my memory serves me correctly, the reason why they fled was because Captain Von Trapp was going to be forced to serve the Nazis and he refused to do so on moral grounds, so they could not stay put in Austria or else they would be marked as traitors and then have to face the consequences. They were in a no-win situation, so they did the only thing that they could do, which was to flee. The average Austrian private citizen would not have been facing the same direct pressures from the high-ranking Nazi military leaders that Captain Von Trapp was facing and he was one of the few who opposed the Nazi Party.
@@susansparke3462 That's how Hollywood depicted it, anyway. It helps to look at it from a a post-war perspective, especially if you can't find Austria on a map. For Austrians of the time, it's not unreasonable to feel he refused to do his duty and ran out on his country and people.
I am watching this in November 2020 and I love you guys! My husband and I are in the same situation. I am from Iowa and he is from the UK. We have been married since 2002. We currently live in the midwest (Iowa). As far as traditions, we used to get a present on Christmas Eve. It was usually from my grandparents that lived in Kansas and contained pajamas or something special. One year, I received a Snoopy sleeping bag! Now that I am older and more in charge of Christmas, I have started some new traditions. We get a "Christmas Eve" box that is delivered by Santa or one of his elves a few days before Christmas that we get to open on Christmas Eve. It usually contains new pajamas or Christmas socks (clothing), a new movie, popcorn, reindeer food (with directions), and hot chocolate. Then, on Christmas Day, our stockings have been filled and more (Santa) presents have appeared under the tree. We first open Santa gifts, after a small breakfast (we have a 7-year-old son). If we do not have plans to go to someone and/or no one is coming to our house, we will open the remainder of the presents and then have our main meal as a late lunch. The rest of Christmas Day is spent playing with new toys (gadgets) and watching movies before going to bed. Normally we do not have the day after Christmas as a day off work, but since I am my own boss, I usually take the entire week between Christmas and New Year's Eve/Day off to relax. Side note: In my home, when we give gifts to kids we follow a simple rule. Something you want, something you need, something to wear, and something to read. We are foster parents so we tend to keep it even. We also include one large gift for the entire family to share. (usually a new board game) Christmas is fun at our house!
After I got married, my family watched "How the Grinch Stole Christmas" and the 24 hours of "A Christmas Story" I live in Akron, Ohio which is about 30-35 miles south of Cleveland. The outside scenes of "A Christmas Story" were filmed here. Scenes like where he wins the leg lamp and where he goes outside to look at it. There were other scenes too. The shed and mailbox are still there. Someone stole the shed but eventually returned it 🤣 The parade and department store scenes were shot here too. The house is open for tours and has a gift shop. One year when my husband and I took our daughter and a friend, "Randy " was there signing autographs. The car in the movie is housed in a garage there and looks just like it did in the movie. Not cheap, but worth it.
We always went to Christmas Eve candlelight service and when we got home we could pick one wrapped present to open. Then in the morning there were a few special toys just out and not wrapped that Santa brought. After the excitement of the Santa gifts we would divide up all the presents and take turns opening them one at a time. A breakfast casserole would bake during this time and would be waiting when we finished. This is how I was brought up and how I did Christmas with my own kids. You guys look so festive! Cute couple. Merry Christmas!
Jessica Watson The way I do breakfast casserole: I loaf bread torn into pieces 1 doz eggs 1cup heavy cream 1lb bacon , cooked, cut into pieces or 1 lb ham , chopped or 1 lb sausage , cooked and drained 1lb shredded cheese, cheddar or whatever Assemble casserole Night before . Grease or spray with nonstick spray a deep dish casserole . Alternate layers or bread , meat and cheese, total of six layers. Mix eggs and cream in a bowl, season vs with salt and pepper; pour over the casserole. Cover and refrigerate overnight. Heat oven to 350degrees F. Bake casserole for an hour until cheese is browned and bubbly. Remove from oven and let stand for 10 min. Serve. Garnish with salsa or ketchup if you wish.
We went to midnight Mass, and while we were at church, Santa clause came to our house. So, we got home at about 2 in the morning and would open our gifts. Then my mom would make a huge polish breakfast with a lot of rich foods. We would fall asleep at about 4ish... Then sleep until noonish. Then we spent the day playing. The breakfast thing sounds like heart burn, now that I'm a grandma!
We often opened a gift that was usually pajamas on Christmas Eve. My father would read from Luke chapter 2 in the Bible and the youngest would put the baby Jesus into the manger. Then we went to bed. We do that with my kids now, but they have added on the tradition of watching Elf. It was great for the first 2 years...now I endure it for them.
As a kid in the 1950s-60s in Maryland, what I remember is going shopping in downtown Baltimore before Christmas, where there were four big department stores on one intersection and back then they had fabulous toy departments and amazing store windows and decorations. There would usually be a Christmas concert of some kind, and we too would drive around and look at the lights in the neighborhood. We'd usually watch "A Christmas Carol" sometime during the season. All presents were opened on Christmas morning and then we'd drive an hour to my Grandma's who lived on a dairy farm for "round 2", where there would be more presents, usually a turkey dinner, and lots of cookies and several pies and cakes. The attraction at her house was a large train set around her tree, and she had a player piano that it took two of us kids to operate, with dozens of weird Sousa march rolls and other music from the WWI era. In general, it was a lot like the way it was shown in "A Christmas Story". That was pretty much my brother's reality. Some of the clothes even looked like his, and I do remember the snowsuits you couldn't move in!
I'm from Philadelphia, On Christmas eve we go around and look at the lights in the neighborhood I also remember snow suits that were impossible to move in. When it came to presents, the toys were open under the tree when we came down in the morning. The wrapped ones we opened after dinner with extended family and guests.
Hello fellow Baltimore MD area alumnus. :0) Yes, downtown shopping with mom (is seemed like we were going to a foreign country driving into the center of the city from the suburbs). We always went to the Hecht Company store in Northwood to see Santa. Driving there provided viewing the Christmas light adorned house along Loch Raven Boulevard, always trying to be the first to spot particular houses along the route that always had the biggest and best decorations and lights (there was always the one house with blue lights that looked heavenly). And oh yes, we had the heavy quilted snow suits, our mittens safety pinned to the sleeves so we didn't lose them, and the pants legs pulled down over the tops of our boots with a cord tied around them to keep the snow out of them. Sledding out in Cockeysville on the long hillside between the old County Home (at the top of the hill) all the way down to York Road ..... and then the long trek back to the top for another trip down ....... yeah, these are winter memories, but the are part of my Christmas memories as well ...... because, when we would get home, there was the tree waiting for Santa. We hung our stockings Christmas Eve, and we kids put the gifts we got for each other under the tree Christmas eve ........ Christmas morning, we would get up before the sun and quietly go down to the living room to find the stockings were filled (more about those) and piles and piles of wrapped presents in and stocked under and around the tree .......we were permitted to empty our stocking which were filled with packs of gum, rolls of Life Savers, a perfectly polished apple and an orange, Christmas hard candies and chocolates, a pack of No.2 pencils, a new eraser, a special gift or two and ........ the requisite candy cane. We were not permitted to open anything else until our parents came down, and we were not permitted to wake them until the sun was up (they probably didn't fall into bed until around 3 am)...... then we had to wait for them to have their coffee and comfortably seated, and then the festivities began ...... paper ripping, boxes pried open, squeals of delight, hugs and thank you's, ........ and hen breakfast, back to our gifts, all the while daddy was playing christmas music on the record player ........ sometimes christmas dinner would be at my grandparent's house on the farm, with about 3 or 4 other families there as well (lots of grownups, lots of cousins)....... noisy and wonderful food (all the families pitched in and brought food so grandma didn't do all the cooking for all those people) ....... but the Christmases and thanksgivings that I liked best were the ones when we stayed home and had our dinner the way we like it to be cooked ....... the way my mom would cook it, the way she would let us help her cook it, and set a fancy table, with the best china, the good silver, the fancy glasses and fancy serving dishes........ all memories now, our parents and grandparents are all long gone, we had our own special traditions for our own families with our children, and those times are past now as our children are all grown with their own families, and the kids are either in college or out on their own making their own holiday traditions ....... or not
My favorite Christmas--Santa somehow came early, while we were at my Noni's on Xmas Eve. We came home at 11 or so to find a bicycle, a courduroy teepee, faux fur coats.... The next day we opened mom and dad gifts before breakfast, which was cinnamon rolls, to cut the sweetnessof all the chocolate we found in our stockings.
Because my family is Scandinavian, we had a big dinner on Christmas Eve, usually had roast beef, went to church and then opened our presents. Christmas Day was also a large dinner and visiting with family. We usually had turkey for dinner.
That was a tradition for American pioneer families, too, I think. Especially oranges, a rare treat. I associate both apple and orange scents with this time of year, because my family always made a point to have them around at the holidays.
They are adorable together. It would be cute if they would start a channel together exploring the differences in the cultures that they were brought up in. I mean I know that kind of is what he's doing here- but I would love her perspective on things. My uncle did the opposite, and married a lovely British woman. He stayed over there for the last 10 years of his life. Every time she came over to visit it was so neat to hear what they had to say about the differences in the lifestyle that eats have lived prior to meeting each other. They were clearly meant for each other and it was wonderful to see how they worked through the cultural differences. Not that it would be as much of a culture shock as other different nationalities getting together - my brother Michael is on track to marry a lovely Indian woman named Deepali sometime this year.... I am wondering how different it's going to be for her here.... from what I understand she lived in a rather affluent area in the northern part of India.
Yes we also got to open a present on Christmas Eve picked out of the mound of presents by our Mother. I did the same for my children and they have also followed it with my grandchildren.
Greetings from Dec. 2021! As an American, yes, my family also had the tradition of opening one small present on Christmas eve then the rest on Christmas morning :)
Poor American, we'd do gifts only on Christmas Day, and no stockings. When I was a teen we were less poor and started the stocking thing, but none of us knew how we were supposed to do it. So... we did the stockings on Christmas eve. By that point none of us were confused about the legitimacy of Santa so reason was purely logistical.
Coming from a Latin American family, we have our big Christmas dinner on Christmas Eve (called Noche Buena or "The Good Night") instead of on Christmas day.
Because of our Spanish heritage, Noche Buena is also our Christmas tradition in the Philippines. However it's mostly done at midnight on Christmas Eve.
Growing up, by the time I was 12years old, my parents started having us open all of our Christmas gifts on Christmas Eve. That way they got to sleep later in the morning.
We opened all of our presents on Christmas eve when I was a kid. We also went out to see the Christmas lights and while we were gone Santa would have already been to our house! Magic.
That is a great idea (going out to look at lights and then coming home to presents) it saves xmas morning for sleeping in a bit and a nice family breakfast.
Growing up in the 1970's in America, my family had the tradition of opening presents from my parents in the evening on Christmas eve, as much of Christmas day was dedicated to travel to the grand parents house, where the extended family gathered. I know other families, including my wife's family did the gift exchange on Christmas day.
As a child in frozen northern Ohio our family would decorate a living Christmas tree in a large container, to be planted afterwards outside in a row of it's predecessors, my father would always take us on a tour of the area Christmas lights on Christmas Eve and when we returned home Santa would have come! The Christmas tree was surrounded by presents. My brother and I were allowed to open one small gift each, chosen by our parents. Then we spent the evening watching A Charlie Brown Christmas, Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer and the Grinch Who Stole Christmas. Then off to bed to await Christmas Morning and the gift extravaganza.
Yes I agree! Alastair Sim is the perfect personification of Dickens character and the film itself SEEMS as if it was filmed in the 1840’s instead of the 1950’s.
We also were allowed to open a gift from under tge tree on Christmas Eve. I think mostly so my brother and I would go to sleep. One year my Dad talked me into leaving Santa a steak and a beer instead of cookies. I got a puppy that year. A very Brittish breed, he was a Welsh Corgi the Pembroke variety. Love your videos!!
People who do shift work such as hospital workers, firemen, policemen, etc do not get every holiday off. That made it difficult to celebrate a holiday on the specific day. (I was lucky enough to have a flexible family.) But when possible, we would open gifts on Christmas Eve and then go to the midnight service. And then sleep in on Christmas Day. 🎄🎅🏻🎁 And turkey for dinner on Christmas Day. Good memories!
We wouldn't even dream of opening ANY presents on Christmas Eve! We set out our two socks (the biggest ones we had, so more "stuff" could be put in them: nuts, candy bars, tangerines, etc.) and we'd each have our own chair with our socks draped over the backs of our chairs to be found filled the following morning, and each one had all of their presents on their own chair. That way we had no confusion about whose presents were whose. We couldn't get up, and go downstairs to open presents in the morning, not until mom and daddy came down. The presents were under the tree - until sometime during the night they'd be placed on all 6 of our chairs, to be found when we came down the stairs. We lived in the farm, and we had to feed the animals, clean the pens, collect the eggs, etc. We lived about 7 and a half miles from the nearest town, and an hour from the nearest city, so we didn't do much in the car.
My family's Christmas traditions are rather family oriented. Depending J how everyone's schedules worked out, both sides of the family, my dad's family and my mom's family, would meet up on separate days (some years it was different times on the same day, which was rough), usually one would be Christmas Eve day, and the other on Christmas Day. We'd have dinner (usually with ham and turkey as the center), dessert, and conversation, them we'd distribute gifts to the extended family (my mom's side of the family is huge, so we draw lots on who gives gifts to which family unit). My dad's family stops giving gifts for both Christmas or birthdays after you've hit 18. Christmas Day morning, we'd open our personal gifts (the stuff from just within the nuclear family). A tradition we had for a long time in our family's stockings (until they got harder to find) were these amazing orange flavored and shaped chocolates.
We always had a bath and new jarmies (pajamas) on Christmas Eve, so that we would look our best for Santy/ Father Christmas. A sherry and two mince pies were left out for Santy and carrots for the reindeer.
Candle Light Christmas Eve service at church yearly. Hang out on Christmas Day at a relative's home to visit with family and friends and eat stuff I don't touch the rest of the year.
I remember going to Midnight Mass every year as a kid and w hen we got home we got to open a present, then off to bed. Tamales for breakfast on Christmas Day. Then opening our presents, except that year my parents got us a dog. My Dad picked him up early on Christmas Day since the pup was from a friend of my father's and it was going to be a surprise. The puppy's yipping and running woke us up to him being there. Christmas meal was usually a late lunch or an early dinner depending on what family members were coming over or who we were going to go eat with.
@@greetswithfire1868 I'm a Brit, and I grew up with us allowed to take one of the smaller gifts from under the tree on Xmas Eve and open them together after dinner.
We would have a mincemeat pie at my grandparents’ house on Christmas Eve. One year my aunt convinced one of our relatives that mincemeat was made out of little mouselike animals called minces.
I forgot my dad’s “joke” which was to give both me and my brother a dead battery with a label stuck to it saying “Toy not included”. Funny first time, less so the more he did it.
Ha ha. Once my mom insisted that we open one package on Christmas Eve before going to church. My dad and I hated the idea, so we handed her the dumbest wrapped thing under the tree: a pack of AA batteries. Then he and I did not open anything.
My brother-in-law used to give my sister a mystery gift wrapped up in an entire roll of masking tape with the proviso that she must unwrap it with her teeth. After they had been married for a few years and had 2 kids he changed it over to duct tape and gave her permission to start using 1 hand since the kids might need attention.
Second generation Polish-American here, so I think some of this may have Eastern-European origins. My aunt and cousins would come to mom's house and we'd have either ham or turkey and the all the fixings. Before dinner, we would each be given a piece of Christmas wafer (oplatek), which is made of flour and water (the same thing a Catholic host was made of?). We would take turns breaking the piece with each member in attendance and wishing good health, success, love, etc to each person at the table. After dinner, we would each open 1 gift and then sit around and talk, sing Christmas carols, watch Christmas movies until we went to midnight Mass. We would open Santa's gifts and any other gifts on Christmas morning. Sometime after noon, we would go visit other relatives and get home in time to scarf up the left over turkey or ham before bed. Ahhhh, the memories. It all ended when mom passed. I really miss those Christmas Eves.
My mother's family were immigrants from Eastern Europe. They were nominally 'Polish' but there was no Poland when they immigrated. We would have a Christmas Eve Supper often with 2 kinds of fish and pierogi.
we also opened a small, usually the smallest gift on Christmas eve. My family and many of my friends all got a stocking that had an orange inside. and other candies but the consistant was always the orange.
Our Christmas eve gift was always brand new and washed so they were soft and clean. Sometimes new stuff was stiff (well flannel our house was cold 🥶 in mornings and nights) Sometimes we got games too. So we'd eat and change into the jammies and play board games and eat fresh popcorn and Sometimes string popcorn for the tree once it went outside.
Same tradition here in West Virginia, we always got to open one gift Christmas eve. On Christmas morning the gifts from Santa were unwrapped and all others wrapped. Love my eggnog but absolutely hate fruitcake.
Ah, you never had my old mum's traditional boozy fruity Christmas cake. I have never tasted a more beautiful moist and light cake with the apricot jam as glue for the marzipan layer over the top and side, the white royal icing over the top and side of the marzipan layer, the decorations and ribbons making a wonderful Christmas snow scene. She also put the same fed fruit cake at the core of her other special occasion cakes. My mum made my lovely wedding cake. She passed on early this year at the grand old age of 100, almost making it to her 101. I miss her Christmas spirit. I bet she's baking up a storm up there.😊
S. Michael DeHart aka WVUmounties8 I live in eastern Canada. We have the same tradition in our family, presents from Santa are unwrapped, all other presents are wrapped.
I'm in England, and when we were kids we always used to have 1 present each set aside for Christmas Eve, and another set aside for after Christmas dinner. They're both traditions I've carried across now I have kids of my own.
We live along the border with Canada. My dad s parents were Brits. Every Christmas Day, at 3 PM, we turned on the tv and watched the Queen s Christmas Message. It wasn t Christmas without her!
As we didn't have a chimney, I used to leave my Christmas list in a tree and worry the rest of the year about how Father Christmas was going to get into the house to leave all the presents. The year we went to Florida was the worst as I was convinced Father Christmas wouldn't even know where we were let alone how to break-in into an unfamiliar house. The temptation to misbehave was overwhelming that year, why not right? As it happened he managed to find us visiting friends in Fort Lauderdale, so I was relieved in the end not to have misbehaved. Dodged a bullet there right?
My sister's both married into Norwegian-American Lutheran families, who opened the gifts on Christmas Eve after church. So they did Eve with the in-laws, then came home for presents and feast on Christmas Day.
You should do an episode all on Christmas films. From a Christmas film perspective all the old British versions of “A Christmas Carol” and now “Love Actually” are the British films that we watch. But for American films we like the older films like “White Christmas”, “Miracle on 34th Street” (original in B&W), “Christmas in Connecticut” and maybe “It’s a Wonderful Life”.
We did the one present on Christmas Eve thing too. My sister and I always got matching pajamas. It must be common all over the US. I grew up in Massachusetts.
Not UK nor US here. In Denmark 24th. through 26th of December are national holidays. On Christmas Eve we ‘do it all’ in one evening. We had Pork roast and duck roast, potatoes, chips, gravy... Danish “Ris a la mande” (a sweet rice and almond puddingish thing) for dessert. With an “almond gift” for the lucky person who finds the whole almond hidden in one of the servings. Then we walk around the christmas tree and sing christmas carols. Then we sit down and breathe and relax and open all the presents. When my grandmother was alive she would throw huge christmas-lunch parties on both the 25 th. and the 26th. One day for the family, next day for friends. My parents and I attended both. So 24-26th. was an eating and drinking christmas marathon for us. My grandmother must have been knackered! Luckily my grandmother lived in a large flat around the corner, so we didn’t have to walk far. My brother lived in London, UK for 30-ish years, I’m fairly well aqquainted with the UK christmas. Christmas pudding could not beat Ris a la mande, in my opinion.
I find your comparisons of each cultural practice so interesting. My father’s family were lead miners in Allendale. They left for America in 1849 after they were blackballed in a labor dispute. After Pandemic is over, I plan to go across the Pond to visit all of England. And, you are very entertaining!
Growing up, Christmas Eve involved a huge meal with tons of relatives present, midnight church service, opening presents Christmas Day and visiting relatives houses. It was very nice.
Here are my memories of Christmas, born and raised in England in the seventies, with a German Dad (but all other relatives British). Father Christmas made his appearance Christmas Eve during my afternoon nap and announced his leaving by ringing the doorbell. All the gifts were in a huge paper/net red stocking in the living room floor. Christmas Day we went to my Gran and Uncle for lunch (turkey and stuffing and vegs) and teatime (Christmas cake, mostly) and shared gifts there. Boxing Day my Gran and Uncle came and had lunch with us (Duck, and apple cider is what I remember), and then to the wonderful party at our church, fun games for all ages. After Christmas, late December, my Gran and Uncle would take me to a pantomime.
My family never stopped stockings. Even as a college student mom stuffed mine with candy and something useful. My high schoolers always get undies and candy, I added an ornament to commerate something special that happened that year. Also I love the "midnight"service (it's at seven at my aunt's church, were I spend Christmas Eve). Candles and Silent Night, yay.
We never opened Christmas presents on Christmas Eve except for once. My folks bought our first color TV set as a family present. That year, 1968 Apollo 8 orbited the moon on Christmas eve. My folks opened the present early so we could see the broadcast. For the first time we saw close up videos of the moon. The mission commander, Frank Borman read from the book of genesis. It was very moving and fitting for Christmas eve.
I remember the excitement on going to bed Christmas Eve, when dad hung up empty pillowcases at the end of our beds and in the morning they would amazingly be bulging with presents - Father Christmas had been!
While "It's a Wonderful Life" is VERY American, ANY version of "A Christmas Carol" (Even "Americanized" ones), has always struck me as being VERY English.
Probably because it was written by Charles Dickens, who was a quintessentially British author, and the story takes place in Victorian England, don’t you think?
@@SongOfEire Yes, Obviously. That's why I said "even Americanized version". There's no need to "Americanize" a story written by an American, Don't ya think.
we would open all the gifts from each other on Christmas eve, and then the next morning we would open the gifts from Santa and eat the candy from our stocking after breakfast on Christmas morning. As an adult I asked my mom why we did it that way and was told that as kids, her family had such a tiny house and such a big family that there wasn't room for gifts from each other AND the gifts from Santa at the same time. We still do it that way tho
In Indiana we opened all ours around 5 or 6 in the morning and our stockings are filled with goodys candy nuts fruit candy canes but my mother and fathetwere actually born in Chicago dad was born in1907 and his parents were polish and my mom was born in 1918 and her father was Scottish and her mother was Norwegian and in truth all my brothers and sisters were born in Chicago we lived on a farm animals are taken care of in the evening and morning
My people came from London England 1911 and they always had fruitcake at Christmas🎄... I love fruitcake with my hot cup of tea ☕ and we always have ham for 🎄Christmas dinner ...The movie Die Hard I think is only a Christmas movie from a mans perspective us women like a good story🎄and the Hallmark channels have many good ones...wishing You Both 🎄⛄Merry Christmas and a Blessed and Happy New Year 🍷🍷🎉🎉🎉
In my family our tradition is not having a tradition. So, year to year its a different thing. One year we opened presents on Christmas Eve. Another year we had a massive Christmas lunch and then opened gifts. My dad is bi polar so his mind never quite settled on a tradition. It's actually okay, I have friends who never experienced any other tradition(s) because they've always did another. For me, I had the chance to try them all. I like the comforts, big piping cup of hot cocoa, fleece blanket, family gathered, and we watch a Christmas movie. To me, that's as close as I can come to a tradition that hasn't died or lost it's magic and lustre.
We don't necessarily have a tradition or do the exact same thing each year in my family but one tradition we do have that I love is pyjamas on Christmas eve. I don't mind doing something different each year so long as I get my pyjamas and my whole family together.
So I’m from Tennessee, 47 & had a fairly basic Christmas- no cookies, or stockings or extras but unusually- we had home Christmas on the eve and Christmas Day was always at my grandparents house for potluck with about 40 first cousins- 18 aunt and uncles and we each also had a gift from them under their tree. Good times But since I didn’t ever have a lot of the traditions- I started them up with all my own kids- such as making cookies, setting them out, stockings, Christmas lights and etc.... And I made sure they got to wake up Christmas morning and unwrap at home and we make breakfast/brunch Christmas Day foods to munch on- particularly anything appetiser style.
We always went to the Christmas Eve candlelight service and when we got home, we would each pick a present to open that night. Christmas Day, we open all the other presents and stockings
The big thing on Christmas Eve, from when I was a kid until now, was to go to midnight mass. It was the biggest, splashiest, most wonderful mass of the year. Even people who don't go to church go to midnight mass. The hymns and pageantry are amazing. Our newer traditions since I was dating and got married have been to open gifts on Christmas Eve. (I'm not my mother, so I can't cook all day and enjoy Christmas!)
When we were kids we used to open one present on Christmas Eve. In retrospect, I now realize this was a clever ploy on my parents' part, as the presents we opened were specifically designed to keep us quiet in the car on the (short but crowded with various other relations who'd come to stay) drive to my aunt and uncle's house the next morning. We don't have any family close by or able to visit us anymore, so now we just stay up insanely late, roll out of bed around ten, throw the turkey in the oven and open presents whenever. I miss having extended family close by, but there's a lot to be said for having no schedule and no obligations for Christmas. Not least of which, no one has to have ham.
@@landon3573 We did ham when I was a kid, but when I hit my teenage years and took over the cooking, it emerged that my dad was the only one in the entire family, nuclear or extended, who actually *liked* ham... so when he lit out for greener pastures we decided we'd never do ham again. It probably helps that I make a damn good turkey - there have been minor fisticuffs over the leftovers.
In the English story A Child’s Christmas in Wales the child gets one gift on Christmas Eve. I am from Canada. Our heritage is English. Our traditions are a mix of each culture. Essentially we do it all.
The Christmas season started Thanksgiving day for us. We had meal at grandparents, men watched football, grandma and kids went to den and kids decorate tree. Christmas Eve day again went to grandparents. We also got PJs and got to open a small gift Christmas Eve. Nice to know was a tradition among other families...BTW grandparents lived in NC
Christmas Eve was tamales with the extended family at my great-aunt's place. We'd also leave cookies out for Santa (homemade was ideal, but storebought worked in a pinch) and carrots and oats for the reindeer. Mustn't forget them! Christmas Day Santa would have filled our stockings, plus left one gift (unwrapped so we knew it was from him!). We could open and play with those until parents woke up. Then it was gifts at home before going to grandma's for celebrating with family. More stockings, a special breakfast we only got on Christmas, more gifts, and holiday dinner at about 3pm (we pretty much had a formulaic holiday dinner based around turkey that we ate at Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Easter and is pretty close to the classic turkey Thanksgiving dinner).
My grandmother (my Dad's mum) made the most amazing mince pies (she made the best flaky pie crusts). They were mostly raisins and sweet bits. We also opened one gift on Christmas Eve, and our stockings were hung at the foot of our beds to appease us for 10 minutes on Christmas morning so that we would not wake the parents before 6 am. You two are adorable. Season's Greetings and lots of love and health to you both!.
I grew up in the US. We opened a single present each on Christmas Eve. My mother always chose it. It was ALWAYS pajamas. I was in high school or university one Xmas, and my mother handed my older sister and I our box. We exclaimed “yay! New pajamas” before opening it. Our mother was aghast. “How did you know?” Lol. Every year, Ma. Every year.
Just stumbled across you channel and chose it because of Tarik’s look. Love the glasses. Love the sweaters. The uniqueness of you both. I think you’re hilarious! Your facts and figures are really interesting.
Christmas Tradition-- Gouging of the candles..when we were young my grandma worked at a candle factory and would give us decorative candle figurines. one year the face of one got scratched so there was a revenge scratching of the other's candle---- this degraded into completely gouging the faces off of both candles--- and the tradition occasionally resurfaces... and the wax piles of choir boys, snowmen and elves (now de-faced) get lit, melted and tossed. Merry Psychopath-mas.
As I grew older, we started opening up one, then two presents on Christmas Eve. Our stockings contained smallish presents but also fruits and nuts. We also drove around looking at decorations and Dad knew what neighborhoods were best.
By the time I was a teenager we had worn my mother down and ended up opening ALL of the presents on Christmas Eve. Christmas Day we usually go to the movie theatre to see the latest must see movie. Christmas Eve pre-presents we have a big family dinner.
We had Christmas Eve at my Aunt & Uncle’s house. It was dinner and and visiting with relatives that included my Uncle’s parents and siblings. We would then go to church. After church we returned to my Aunt & Uncle’s house and opened gifts (that is when my cousins got their biggest haul). Cookies would be put out for Santa that night before bed. Then Christmas morning my sister and I got our stockings which included fruit and some candies like kisses or foil wrapped chocolate ornaments. Then the big celebration was at our house. This was all the great aunts & uncles, my mother and aunt’s parents plus cousins, I mean there had to be 20+ people. There were hors d’oeuvers drinks and then we got to open presents. Then playing, conversation and dinner.
Must-see Christmas films (a short list): A Christmas Carol (Alastair Sim), It's a Wonderful Life, The Snowman (Based on the Raymond Briggs' book), A Child's Christmas in Wales, A Charlie Brown Christmas, Miracle on 34th Street, and Babes in Toyland (Laurel & Hardy),
We would have a stocking with some Quality Street, chocolate coins, orange 🍊 apple 🍏 and nuts, with a small toy. We use to have our presents at the foot of the bed. We had a holly tree as a Christmas Tree with small candles not lights. The tree was put up the Sunday before Christmas and Father Christmas 🎄 put up the decorations. Not like today when they are put up weeks in advance, but ours never came down before 12th night, the 6th. January.
We got a package Christmas Eve too. It was always PJs. And we got to a concert and Nutcracker every year too. We also make cookies, but not the night before as we give them out to all our friends/teachers/etc. I was surprised to hear how similar our traditions were!!
As a Hungarian American one of our traditions is baking Kiffles with Lekvar. For those who may not know these are Christmas cookies. It is a crescent shaped light flaky cream cheese pastry filled with plum/prune butter and sprinkled with sugar. Delicious!!! Merry Christmas 🎄🎁 to you…
In Denmark santa gets rice porridge, it's important to keep a varied diet, and with every country doing something different we're keeping santa healthy...
I hope someone gets him some vegetables
@@emberhermin52 Let's not get carried away with that health fad...
At our house Santa got chocolate covered cherries and a Bud Light. Dad had terrible taste in beer, lol. We also left carrots and apples for the reindeer.
He gets whisky and a deep fried Mars Bar in Scotland... I don't feel like we're helping 😂😂😂
@@TheBarkinFrogLow rent cookies (such as Lorna Doones 🤢🤮) for Santa, a carrot for Rudolph & Co. I loved to examine the carrot stub for tell-tale teeth (love alliteration) marks. This was before checking out what Santa left. Always believed reindeer were the true heroes of Christmas Eve.
I’m English and we were allowed to open one Christmas gift (but only a small one!), on Christmas Eve, after we had walked home through the village from Midnight Mass. Also, we never had our gifts placed under the tree, we had a sack full of gifts left by Santa at the end of our beds and we would carry our sacks down stairs to open them around the tree together.
This will be my 56th and last UK Christmas.
Merry Christmas to everyone.
Watching this in July, since I just discovered this channel recently. I love our family's tradition - bear with me, I'll try to make it as short as I can. First, my mother, rest her soul, couldn't bear the thought of anyone alone at Christmas so she started a tradition of inviting people over on Christmas eve that normally would be alone, and then it morphed into more and more people - there were some years we would have 50 people, and our house is not huge. Every room in the house was decorated for Christmas, even the bathrooms, and the outside as well. Christmas eve was spent all day cooking and polishing. In the evening, we would have a feast of turkey, pork roast, ham, sometimes roast beef, plus all the veg and salads and side dishes. Everyone that came to the party usually brought a dessert, so we would have a TON of desserts. And my mom made a fabulous punch (non-alcoholic). Before eating, someone would say grace and after eating, we would gather in one room for a big White Elephant/Yankee Swap gift exchange. Before the gift exchange, we would sing a few Christmas carols and someone would read the nativity story from the Bible, out of Luke 2. Then, one by one, each person would have a turn (if they chose) to say something; usually, it was a chance to give thanks for blessings in our lives. After that, we had the gift exchange. They were hilarious and the party usually wouldn't break up until after midnight. My family would stay up, putting food in the fridge and cleaning up and putting out the stockings by the fireplace before finally falling into bed. Early the next morning, everyone comes over and my sister would bring over a big pot of Russian tea and we sip it and coffee and pastries and everyone opens their presents. For our meal, we would have leftovers from the feast the night before. The whole day is spent opening presents, eating and laughing. I wouldn't trade the world for our traditions and for the memories I have of them. (Sorry this was so long.)
I think of all the traditions that was the best. My family was large. The've all scattered to different states. This year we, being Mexican-American, i spent 3 days making beef tamales. They were wonderful!
This was delightful to read. May your mom's traditions be carried on. What a lovely lady 👩
@@s.v.2796 oh those sound delicious 😋
Bless your dear sweet mama's heart.
I worked at a HUGE law firm in Los Angeles. Many of the staff were single and had NO family near L.A. The Personnel Director, actually invited ALL of them to her house for Thanksgiving and Christmas and Easter!!!
Wow, what an awesome tradition!
My daughter is twenty two years old. I still fill a stocking for her. Everyone gets a Christmas stocking when they visit us Christmas Day. I have actually bought extra items just for this purpose. When my daughter was younger, she had pet Guinea pigs. She insisted that they be included. We still have the tiny stockings. Rachel filled them with carrots for her "babies ".
Another tradition in our home is the decorating. We trim the tree ( and shamelessly over decorate most flat surfaces) in time for the first Sunday in Advent. Christmas activities last until Epiphany.
You sound like you’re a wonderful mother! ♥️
Just remembered the plum pudding with hot custard my (English) mother used to make every Christmas and it unexpectedly made me tear up. May she rest in peace.
My old mum used to put a generous slosh of either brandy or sherry into the custard for the pudding. (Hic!) By the way, what the 12th Doctor said about the last thing in a stocking. It's true, nobody likes the satsuma. 😁
_Days Gone By...._
Rih (Rest In Heaven)
Thanks, all, for the replies.
My mom made this too. I can make the hot sauce but don't have her plum pudding recipe.
My Army father was stationed in the Netherlands when I was small. Every year we had three Christmases:1) the Dutch Christmas when we got candy in our shoes, 2) the traditional American Christmas with gifts mostly ordered from Sears in the US, and 3) the "stuff that came late from Sears Christmas" when my parents got the last of the orders from Sears and wrapped them up and hid them around so it looked like Santa might have dropped it when he was here on the 25th. One year my mom pulled a package out from behind the couch. "Look," she said. "Santa must have dropped this. It has your name on it" I asked her why my name was in her handwriting and she explained, :Santa was running late, so he asked me to write your name on it." It sounded right to me!
My Mom did that with the wrapping paper too. She said that to save time, Santa had given all our gifts to her directly and asked her to wrap them for him. I sort of believed her..
@@amydufresne5137 ?
My family tradition was exactly the same: one present on Christmas Eve. The rest Christmas morning.
Mine too
@@michimelody4036
Me three. One present could be opened after midnight mass, all the rest were opened on Christmas day.
Same here. Pajamas or nightgown was one, and then a selected one - either a book or a quiet game. In the morning - everything else.
@@jeandiatasmith4512 As children it was a really cute Christmas nightgown or pajamas. As adults it's usually something we just can't wait to give another member in the family. Or funny pajamas.
My mom’s side did, my dad’s didn’t. So we ended up doing it some years-especially if we had pajamas to open-but not in others.
As an Austrian we surprisingly don't watch the sound of music (I have never seen that movie although the story is based in Austria 🙈), we go to church in the afternoon before Christmas eve, then open all the presents. Those are brought not by Santa, but by "Christkind" who is basically a golden angel, and after that we go to church again at midnight.
Lovely. I love going to church at Christmas. Are you Lutheran?
My understanding is that the von Trapp family was very unpopular in Austria, because they basically ran out on their country when things started going downhill, while everybody else stuck it out.
@@goombabear Austria is mainly Catholic. The Lutherans are the majority in northern Germany.
@@JohnDoe-fu6zt If my memory serves me correctly, the reason why they fled was because Captain Von Trapp was going to be forced to serve the Nazis and he refused to do so on moral grounds, so they could not stay put in Austria or else they would be marked as traitors and then have to face the consequences. They were in a no-win situation, so they did the only thing that they could do, which was to flee. The average Austrian private citizen would not have been facing the same direct pressures from the high-ranking Nazi military leaders that Captain Von Trapp was facing and he was one of the few who opposed the Nazi Party.
@@susansparke3462 That's how Hollywood depicted it, anyway. It helps to look at it from a a post-war perspective, especially if you can't find Austria on a map. For Austrians of the time, it's not unreasonable to feel he refused to do his duty and ran out on his country and people.
I am watching this in November 2020 and I love you guys! My husband and I are in the same situation. I am from Iowa and he is from the UK. We have been married since 2002. We currently live in the midwest (Iowa).
As far as traditions, we used to get a present on Christmas Eve. It was usually from my grandparents that lived in Kansas and contained pajamas or something special. One year, I received a Snoopy sleeping bag! Now that I am older and more in charge of Christmas, I have started some new traditions. We get a "Christmas Eve" box that is delivered by Santa or one of his elves a few days before Christmas that we get to open on Christmas Eve. It usually contains new pajamas or Christmas socks (clothing), a new movie, popcorn, reindeer food (with directions), and hot chocolate.
Then, on Christmas Day, our stockings have been filled and more (Santa) presents have appeared under the tree. We first open Santa gifts, after a small breakfast (we have a 7-year-old son). If we do not have plans to go to someone and/or no one is coming to our house, we will open the remainder of the presents and then have our main meal as a late lunch. The rest of Christmas Day is spent playing with new toys (gadgets) and watching movies before going to bed. Normally we do not have the day after Christmas as a day off work, but since I am my own boss, I usually take the entire week between Christmas and New Year's Eve/Day off to relax.
Side note: In my home, when we give gifts to kids we follow a simple rule. Something you want, something you need, something to wear, and something to read. We are foster parents so we tend to keep it even. We also include one large gift for the entire family to share. (usually a new board game) Christmas is fun at our house!
We used to keep our TV tuned into TBS all day long for the 24 hour A Christmas Story marathon.
Angela Bürkle , Some men are Baptist’s, others Catholics; my dad was an Oldsmobile man!! LOL
After I got married, my family watched "How the Grinch Stole Christmas" and the 24 hours of "A Christmas Story" I live in Akron, Ohio which is about 30-35 miles south of Cleveland. The outside scenes of "A Christmas Story" were filmed here. Scenes like where he wins the leg lamp and where he goes outside to look at it. There were other scenes too. The shed and mailbox are still there. Someone stole the shed but eventually returned it 🤣 The parade and department store scenes were shot here too. The house is open for tours and has a gift shop. One year when my husband and I took our daughter and a friend, "Randy " was there signing autographs. The car in the movie is housed in a garage there and looks just like it did in the movie. Not cheap, but worth it.
"It's a major award!"
Still do!
YES!
We always went to Christmas Eve candlelight service and when we got home we could pick one wrapped present to open. Then in the morning there were a few special toys just out and not wrapped that Santa brought. After the excitement of the Santa gifts we would divide up all the presents and take turns opening them one at a time. A breakfast casserole would bake during this time and would be waiting when we finished. This is how I was brought up and how I did Christmas with my own kids. You guys look so festive! Cute couple. Merry Christmas!
We did candlelight service and breakfast casserole too!
What’s breakfast casarole? We have a fry up before opening presents, overwise everyone’s to hungry.
Jessica Watson The way I do breakfast casserole:
I loaf bread torn into pieces
1 doz eggs
1cup heavy cream
1lb bacon , cooked, cut into pieces or
1 lb ham , chopped or
1 lb sausage , cooked and drained
1lb shredded cheese, cheddar or whatever
Assemble casserole Night before .
Grease or spray with nonstick spray a deep dish casserole .
Alternate layers or bread , meat and cheese, total of six layers. Mix eggs and cream in a bowl, season vs with salt and pepper; pour over the casserole. Cover and refrigerate overnight.
Heat oven to 350degrees F. Bake casserole for an hour until cheese is browned and bubbly. Remove from oven and let stand for 10 min. Serve. Garnish with salsa or ketchup if you wish.
We went to midnight Mass, and while we were at church, Santa clause came to our house. So, we got home at about 2 in the morning and would open our gifts. Then my mom would make a huge polish breakfast with a lot of rich foods. We would fall asleep at about 4ish... Then sleep until noonish. Then we spent the day playing. The breakfast thing sounds like heart burn, now that I'm a grandma!
Family gifts were exchanged on Christmas Eve. Santa’s gifts were opened on Christmas morning.
That’s what we did!
Same in my family.
Same here! Loved getting gifts both days
Same at our house
Me too
Danny Kaye and Bing Crosby in White Christmas a must. Have now introduced the Fourth generation of this classic.
I agree about White Christmas. Love watching it during the holiday season.
White Christmas and 34th Street.
I never liked White Christmas, but Holliday Inn is great. Unfortunately it can't be shown any more because of racially insensitive scenes.
Yes! My kids - 15 years and 5 year old twins - love that movie. We watch it several times around Christmas.
@@DavidSmith-kd8mw DVD... we have it and watch it every year. This is one reason folks should not do away with physical media!
making fudge on Christmas eve and watching it's a wonderful life is one of my favorite Christmas memories
We often opened a gift that was usually pajamas on Christmas Eve. My father would read from Luke chapter 2 in the Bible and the youngest would put the baby Jesus into the manger. Then we went to bed.
We do that with my kids now, but they have added on the tradition of watching Elf. It was great for the first 2 years...now I endure it for them.
Do you watch it’s a wonderful life and home alone good movies
As a kid in the 1950s-60s in Maryland, what I remember is going shopping in downtown Baltimore before Christmas, where there were four big department stores on one intersection and back then they had fabulous toy departments and amazing store windows and decorations. There would usually be a Christmas concert of some kind, and we too would drive around and look at the lights in the neighborhood. We'd usually watch "A Christmas Carol" sometime during the season.
All presents were opened on Christmas morning and then we'd drive an hour to my Grandma's who lived on a dairy farm for "round 2", where there would be more presents, usually a turkey dinner, and lots of cookies and several pies and cakes. The attraction at her house was a large train set around her tree, and she had a player piano that it took two of us kids to operate, with dozens of weird Sousa march rolls and other music from the WWI era.
In general, it was a lot like the way it was shown in "A Christmas Story". That was pretty much my brother's reality. Some of the clothes even looked like his, and I do remember the snowsuits you couldn't move in!
I'm from Philadelphia, On Christmas eve we go around and look at the lights in the neighborhood I also remember snow suits that were impossible to move in. When it came to presents, the toys were open under the tree when we came down in the morning. The wrapped ones we opened after dinner with extended family and guests.
Hello fellow Baltimore MD area alumnus. :0) Yes, downtown shopping with mom (is seemed like we were going to a foreign country driving into the center of the city from the suburbs). We always went to the Hecht Company store in Northwood to see Santa. Driving there provided viewing the Christmas light adorned house along Loch Raven Boulevard, always trying to be the first to spot particular houses along the route that always had the biggest and best decorations and lights (there was always the one house with blue lights that looked heavenly). And oh yes, we had the heavy quilted snow suits, our mittens safety pinned to the sleeves so we didn't lose them, and the pants legs pulled down over the tops of our boots with a cord tied around them to keep the snow out of them. Sledding out in Cockeysville on the long hillside between the old County Home (at the top of the hill) all the way down to York Road ..... and then the long trek back to the top for another trip down ....... yeah, these are winter memories, but the are part of my Christmas memories as well ...... because, when we would get home, there was the tree waiting for Santa. We hung our stockings Christmas Eve, and we kids put the gifts we got for each other under the tree Christmas eve ........ Christmas morning, we would get up before the sun and quietly go down to the living room to find the stockings were filled (more about those) and piles and piles of wrapped presents in and stocked under and around the tree .......we were permitted to empty our stocking which were filled with packs of gum, rolls of Life Savers, a perfectly polished apple and an orange, Christmas hard candies and chocolates, a pack of No.2 pencils, a new eraser, a special gift or two and ........ the requisite candy cane. We were not permitted to open anything else until our parents came down, and we were not permitted to wake them until the sun was up (they probably didn't fall into bed until around 3 am)...... then we had to wait for them to have their coffee and comfortably seated, and then the festivities began ...... paper ripping, boxes pried open, squeals of delight, hugs and thank you's, ........ and hen breakfast, back to our gifts, all the while daddy was playing christmas music on the record player ........ sometimes christmas dinner would be at my grandparent's house on the farm, with about 3 or 4 other families there as well (lots of grownups, lots of cousins)....... noisy and wonderful food (all the families pitched in and brought food so grandma didn't do all the cooking for all those people) ....... but the Christmases and thanksgivings that I liked best were the ones when we stayed home and had our dinner the way we like it to be cooked ....... the way my mom would cook it, the way she would let us help her cook it, and set a fancy table, with the best china, the good silver, the fancy glasses and fancy serving dishes........ all memories now, our parents and grandparents are all long gone, we had our own special traditions for our own families with our children, and those times are past now as our children are all grown with their own families, and the kids are either in college or out on their own making their own holiday traditions ....... or not
My favorite Christmas--Santa somehow came early, while we were at my Noni's on Xmas Eve. We came home at 11 or so to find a bicycle, a courduroy teepee, faux fur coats.... The next day we opened mom and dad gifts before breakfast, which was cinnamon rolls, to cut the sweetnessof all the chocolate we found in our stockings.
Because my family is Scandinavian, we had a big dinner on Christmas Eve, usually had roast beef, went to church and then opened our presents. Christmas Day was also a large dinner and visiting with family. We usually had turkey for dinner.
My grandmother made a lot of lefse at Christmas for her children and grandchildren . It was a real treat.
In our Christmas stockings we always had apples and oranges it was tradition my family had since the great depression
Interesting. Are you English or from the US?
We also had nuts in their shells.
Same here with nuts in shells. Deep South
That was a tradition for American pioneer families, too, I think. Especially oranges, a rare treat. I associate both apple and orange scents with this time of year, because my family always made a point to have them around at the holidays.
In Canada in the 1950s & 1960s : Mandarin Oranges, nuts and chocolate coins
You need your missus involved more often mate. She’s excellent 😀
She has her own vlog. Although I don't know the name. I think he lists it.
I agree. He is BETTER with her. Much better!!!
Old fashioned af is her xhannel
They are adorable together. It would be cute if they would start a channel together exploring the differences in the cultures that they were brought up in. I mean I know that kind of is what he's doing here- but I would love her perspective on things.
My uncle did the opposite, and married a lovely British woman. He stayed over there for the last 10 years of his life. Every time she came over to visit it was so neat to hear what they had to say about the differences in the lifestyle that eats have lived prior to meeting each other. They were clearly meant for each other and it was wonderful to see how they worked through the cultural differences. Not that it would be as much of a culture shock as other different nationalities getting together - my brother Michael is on track to marry a lovely Indian woman named Deepali sometime this year.... I am wondering how different it's going to be for her here.... from what I understand she lived in a rather affluent area in the northern part of India.
Laurence should have more videos with Tara (his wife)and Kafka (the cat)
Muppet Christmas Carol is my favorite Christmas movie, though It's a Wonderful Life is up there.
Add Emmett Otter’s Jug Band Christmas....also the muppet guys
We watch the muppets Christmas Carol every year in December! It is our favourite, alongside national lampoon's Christmas vacation 😊
Yes we also got to open a present on Christmas Eve picked out of the mound of presents by our Mother. I did the same for my children and they have also followed it with my grandchildren.
Greetings from Dec. 2021! As an American, yes, my family also had the tradition of opening one small present on Christmas eve then the rest on Christmas morning :)
I'm an American. Our family never opened gifts on Christmas Eve. Only Christmas morning. Stockings first and then the packages.
We always opened the gifts and after breakfast we opened the stockings
Brian Gourley we do it the other way around. Open the stockings in bed then, open the gifts after breakfast.
Poor American, we'd do gifts only on Christmas Day, and no stockings. When I was a teen we were less poor and started the stocking thing, but none of us knew how we were supposed to do it. So... we did the stockings on Christmas eve. By that point none of us were confused about the legitimacy of Santa so reason was purely logistical.
No Christmas eve opening? I'll get the coffee started at 400am.
@@briangourley9572 Big dinner on Christmas Eve then Christmas Day brunch, then opening the gifts
I'm a Brit, and we used to get new PJs on Christmas Eve, so we we looked good for the photos of opening presents next morning..
haha good one
Great idea.
Coming from a Latin American family, we have our big Christmas dinner on Christmas Eve (called Noche Buena or "The Good Night") instead of on Christmas day.
Us too!!!
Because of our Spanish heritage, Noche Buena is also our Christmas tradition in the Philippines. However it's mostly done at midnight on Christmas Eve.
Growing up, by the time I was 12years old, my parents started having us open all of our Christmas gifts on Christmas Eve. That way they got to sleep later in the morning.
We opened all of our presents on Christmas eve when I was a kid. We also went out to see the Christmas lights and while we were gone Santa would have already been to our house! Magic.
That is a great idea (going out to look at lights and then coming home to presents) it saves xmas morning for sleeping in a bit and a nice family breakfast.
Growing up in the 1970's in America, my family had the tradition of opening presents from my parents in the evening on Christmas eve, as much of Christmas day was dedicated to travel to the grand parents house, where the extended family gathered. I know other families, including my wife's family did the gift exchange on Christmas day.
As a child in frozen northern Ohio our family would decorate a living Christmas tree in a large container, to be planted afterwards outside in a row of it's predecessors, my father would always take us on a tour of the area Christmas lights on Christmas Eve and when we returned home Santa would have come! The Christmas tree was surrounded by presents. My brother and I were allowed to open one small gift each, chosen by our parents. Then we spent the evening watching A Charlie Brown Christmas, Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer and the Grinch Who Stole Christmas. Then off to bed to await Christmas Morning and the gift extravaganza.
A Christmas Carol, 1951 version, Alastair Sim, in B&W , finest kind
I allways watch that too. No other version for me. Alistair simm all the way.
Definitely! Alastair Sim WAS Scrooge (in fact, the UK title is "Scrooge")…far outclasses any other version, much closer in spirit to Dickens' tale.
@@JamesVaughan You know about the face in the mirror of course?
Yes I agree! Alastair Sim is the perfect personification of Dickens character and the film itself SEEMS as if it was filmed in the 1840’s instead of the 1950’s.
Kevin McNeill
What about the face in the mirror? I thought it was Jacob Marley’s?
We also were allowed to open a gift from under tge tree on Christmas Eve. I think mostly so my brother and I would go to sleep. One year my Dad talked me into leaving Santa a steak and a beer instead of cookies. I got a puppy that year. A very Brittish breed, he was a Welsh Corgi the Pembroke variety. Love your videos!!
Whether you watch Love, Actually or Die Hard they have two things in common: Both have Alan Rickman and both are Christmas movies.
Yeah-they should be aired back to back! (😏...)
There will never be another Alan Rickman.
@@trace9657
(😔 😢 Yeah...)
Die Hard is NOT a Christmas movie, it's a movie that takes place in December.
@@davedetroit6475 You are entitled to your incorrect opinion.
People who do shift work such as hospital workers, firemen, policemen, etc do not get every holiday off. That made it difficult to celebrate a holiday on the specific day. (I was lucky enough to have a flexible family.) But when possible, we would open gifts on Christmas Eve and then go to the midnight service. And then sleep in on Christmas Day. 🎄🎅🏻🎁 And turkey for dinner on Christmas Day. Good memories!
We wouldn't even dream of opening ANY presents on Christmas Eve! We set out our two socks (the biggest ones we had, so more "stuff" could be put in them: nuts, candy bars, tangerines, etc.) and we'd each have our own chair with our socks draped over the backs of our chairs to be found filled the following morning, and each one had all of their presents on their own chair. That way we had no confusion about whose presents were whose. We couldn't get up, and go downstairs to open presents in the morning, not until mom and daddy came down. The presents were under the tree - until sometime during the night they'd be placed on all 6 of our chairs, to be found when we came down the stairs. We lived in the farm, and we had to feed the animals, clean the pens, collect the eggs, etc. We lived about 7 and a half miles from the nearest town, and an hour from the nearest city, so we didn't do much in the car.
As an American, I was allowed to open one present on Christmas Eve also.
My family's Christmas traditions are rather family oriented. Depending J how everyone's schedules worked out, both sides of the family, my dad's family and my mom's family, would meet up on separate days (some years it was different times on the same day, which was rough), usually one would be Christmas Eve day, and the other on Christmas Day. We'd have dinner (usually with ham and turkey as the center), dessert, and conversation, them we'd distribute gifts to the extended family (my mom's side of the family is huge, so we draw lots on who gives gifts to which family unit). My dad's family stops giving gifts for both Christmas or birthdays after you've hit 18. Christmas Day morning, we'd open our personal gifts (the stuff from just within the nuclear family). A tradition we had for a long time in our family's stockings (until they got harder to find) were these amazing orange flavored and shaped chocolates.
We always had a bath and new jarmies (pajamas) on Christmas Eve, so that we would look our best for Santy/ Father Christmas.
A sherry and two mince pies were left out for Santy and carrots for the reindeer.
Candle Light Christmas Eve service at church yearly. Hang out on Christmas Day at a relative's home to visit with family and friends and eat stuff I don't touch the rest of the year.
Yes. Candlelight services can be nice!
Love candlelight services but am usually so tired that night and then the next day too.
I knew there must be other people watching this that know Christmas is the celebration of the birth of Jesus Christ. Thank you!😊
I remember going to Midnight Mass every year as a kid and w hen we got home we got to open a present, then off to bed. Tamales for breakfast on Christmas Day. Then opening our presents, except that year my parents got us a dog. My Dad picked him up early on Christmas Day since the pup was from a friend of my father's and it was going to be a surprise. The puppy's yipping and running woke us up to him being there. Christmas meal was usually a late lunch or an early dinner depending on what family members were coming over or who we were going to go eat with.
I had the one gift on Christmas Eve and the rest on Christmas Day.
My family did the same.
Same. We kids would be able to open one gift on Christmas eve, Christmas day would be the big payoff.
@@greetswithfire1868 I'm a Brit, and I grew up with us allowed to take one of the smaller gifts from under the tree on Xmas Eve and open them together after dinner.
Same
My family does pajamas on Christmas Eve and open stockings. On Christmas Day we opened all the other presents.
We would have a mincemeat pie at my grandparents’ house on Christmas Eve. One year my aunt convinced one of our relatives that mincemeat was made out of little mouselike animals called minces.
Oh that’s so delightfully twisted!
This is the kind of thing my big sisters traumatized me with when I was little!
ROFLOL 🤣😂
As a Brit who immigrated to Canada I love these videos!
We exchanged family gifts on Christmas Eve and Santa came Christmas morning.
Same here
Same
My family never thought about doing it any other way.
Same. It was either a gift or gifts from family at a get together, or a single gift on Xmas eve.
Us too
I forgot my dad’s “joke” which was to give both me and my brother a dead battery with a label stuck to it saying “Toy not included”. Funny first time, less so the more he did it.
Ha ha that is funny, but what is it that dad always does the same joke over and over.
Ha ha. Once my mom insisted that we open one package on Christmas Eve before going to church. My dad and I hated the idea, so we handed her the dumbest wrapped thing under the tree: a pack of AA batteries. Then he and I did not open anything.
My brother-in-law used to give my sister a mystery gift wrapped up in an entire roll of masking tape with the proviso that she must unwrap it with her teeth. After they had been married for a few years and had 2 kids he changed it over to duct tape and gave her permission to start using 1 hand since the kids might need attention.
Gotta love dad jokes!
Sounds like my husband's sense of humor. It was funny while we were dating.
Second generation Polish-American here, so I think some of this may have Eastern-European origins.
My aunt and cousins would come to mom's house and we'd have either ham or turkey and the all the fixings. Before dinner, we would each be given a piece of Christmas wafer (oplatek), which is made of flour and water (the same thing a Catholic host was made of?). We would take turns breaking the piece with each member in attendance and wishing good health, success, love, etc to each person at the table.
After dinner, we would each open 1 gift and then sit around and talk, sing Christmas carols, watch Christmas movies until we went to midnight Mass.
We would open Santa's gifts and any other gifts on Christmas morning. Sometime after noon, we would go visit other relatives and get home in time to scarf up the left over turkey or ham before bed.
Ahhhh, the memories. It all ended when mom passed. I really miss those Christmas Eves.
All our Christmas traditions changed when our mom passed, too. My (adult) grand nieces and nephews have no idea what they're missing.
That sounds like a wonderful christmas.
My mother's family were immigrants from Eastern Europe. They were nominally 'Polish' but there was no Poland when they immigrated. We would have a Christmas Eve Supper often with 2 kinds of fish and pierogi.
When I was 8 I got flashbulbs, batteries, and film in my stocking. It never dawned on me that I would be getting a camera.
we also opened a small, usually the smallest gift on Christmas eve. My family and many of my friends all got a stocking that had an orange inside. and other candies but the consistant was always the orange.
Canadian here, my family also opened a single gift on Christmas Eve but it was always pyjamas.
Our Christmas eve gift was always brand new and washed so they were soft and clean. Sometimes new stuff was stiff (well flannel our house was cold 🥶 in mornings and nights) Sometimes we got games too. So we'd eat and change into the jammies and play board games and eat fresh popcorn and Sometimes string popcorn for the tree once it went outside.
Same tradition here in West Virginia, we always got to open one gift Christmas eve. On Christmas morning the gifts from Santa were unwrapped and all others wrapped. Love my eggnog but absolutely hate fruitcake.
Same. Minus the eggnog part lol. Don't like either one.
@@michimelody4036 Yeah, I'm not a fan of either!
Ah, you never had my old mum's traditional boozy fruity Christmas cake. I have never tasted a more beautiful moist and light cake with the apricot jam as glue for the marzipan layer over the top and side, the white royal icing over the top and side of the marzipan layer, the decorations and ribbons making a wonderful Christmas snow scene. She also put the same fed fruit cake at the core of her other special occasion cakes. My mum made my lovely wedding cake. She passed on early this year at the grand old age of 100, almost making it to her 101. I miss her Christmas spirit. I bet she's baking up a storm up there.😊
S. Michael DeHart aka WVUmounties8 I live in eastern Canada. We have the same tradition in our family, presents from Santa are unwrapped, all other presents are wrapped.
Love nog xnay on the fruit cake. Can't stand that dried fruit
I'm in England, and when we were kids we always used to have 1 present each set aside for Christmas Eve, and another set aside for after Christmas dinner. They're both traditions I've carried across now I have kids of my own.
We live along the border with Canada. My dad s parents were Brits. Every Christmas Day, at 3 PM, we turned on the tv and watched the Queen s Christmas Message. It wasn t Christmas without her!
As we didn't have a chimney, I used to leave my Christmas list in a tree and worry the rest of the year about how Father Christmas was going to get into the house to leave all the presents. The year we went to Florida was the worst as I was convinced Father Christmas wouldn't even know where we were let alone how to break-in into an unfamiliar house. The temptation to misbehave was overwhelming that year, why not right? As it happened he managed to find us visiting friends in Fort Lauderdale, so I was relieved in the end not to have misbehaved. Dodged a bullet there right?
My sister's both married into Norwegian-American Lutheran families, who opened the gifts on Christmas Eve after church. So they did Eve with the in-laws, then came home for presents and feast on Christmas Day.
AbozTheUntidy Yep! We always do Eve with my husbands side and Christmas with mine.
this is exactly what we do!
You should do an episode all on Christmas films.
From a Christmas film perspective all the old British versions of “A Christmas Carol” and now “Love Actually” are the British films that we watch. But for American films we like the older films like “White Christmas”, “Miracle on 34th Street” (original in B&W), “Christmas in Connecticut” and maybe “It’s a Wonderful Life”.
Muppet Christmas Carol - but make sure to stop it before Michael Caine sings!
We did the one present on Christmas Eve thing too. My sister and I always got matching pajamas. It must be common all over the US. I grew up in Massachusetts.
Yeah but Santa comes on Christmas
Not UK nor US here. In Denmark 24th. through 26th of December are national holidays. On Christmas Eve we ‘do it all’ in one evening. We had Pork roast and duck roast, potatoes, chips, gravy... Danish “Ris a la mande” (a sweet rice and almond puddingish thing) for dessert. With an “almond gift” for the lucky person who finds the whole almond hidden in one of the servings. Then we walk around the christmas tree and sing christmas carols. Then we sit down and breathe and relax and open all the presents. When my grandmother was alive she would throw huge christmas-lunch parties on both the 25 th. and the 26th. One day for the family, next day for friends. My parents and I attended both. So 24-26th. was an eating and drinking christmas marathon for us. My grandmother must have been knackered! Luckily my grandmother lived in a large flat around the corner, so we didn’t have to walk far. My brother lived in London, UK for 30-ish years, I’m fairly well aqquainted with the UK christmas. Christmas pudding could not beat Ris a la mande, in my opinion.
I find your comparisons of each cultural practice so interesting. My father’s family were lead miners in Allendale. They left for America in 1849 after they were blackballed in a labor dispute. After Pandemic is over, I plan to go across the Pond to visit all of England.
And, you are very entertaining!
Growing up, Christmas Eve involved a huge meal with tons of relatives present, midnight church service, opening presents Christmas Day and visiting relatives houses. It was very nice.
Here are my memories of Christmas, born and raised in England in the seventies, with a German Dad (but all other relatives British). Father Christmas made his appearance Christmas Eve during my afternoon nap and announced his leaving by ringing the doorbell. All the gifts were in a huge paper/net red stocking in the living room floor. Christmas Day we went to my Gran and Uncle for lunch (turkey and stuffing and vegs) and teatime (Christmas cake, mostly) and shared gifts there. Boxing Day my Gran and Uncle came and had lunch with us (Duck, and apple cider is what I remember), and then to the wonderful party at our church, fun games for all ages. After Christmas, late December, my Gran and Uncle would take me to a pantomime.
My family never stopped stockings. Even as a college student mom stuffed mine with candy and something useful. My high schoolers always get undies and candy, I added an ornament to commerate something special that happened that year. Also I love the "midnight"service (it's at seven at my aunt's church, were I spend Christmas Eve). Candles and Silent Night, yay.
We never opened Christmas presents on Christmas Eve except for once. My folks bought our first color TV set as a family present. That year, 1968 Apollo 8 orbited the moon on Christmas eve. My folks opened the present early so we could see the broadcast. For the first time we saw close up videos of the moon. The mission commander, Frank Borman read from the book of genesis. It was very moving and fitting for Christmas eve.
It's so nice to see you two together, thanks.
I remember the excitement on going to bed Christmas Eve, when dad hung up empty pillowcases at the end of our beds and in the morning they would amazingly be bulging with presents - Father Christmas had been!
We got to pick either end of bed or our pillow case could be left labeled with our name on it in the front room!
While "It's a Wonderful Life" is VERY American, ANY version of "A Christmas Carol" (Even "Americanized" ones), has always struck me as being VERY English.
And then there is the movie with Ralphie and his BB gun, and the original Home Alone movies (I & II).
@Ch'iidii Yep, That's a good version!
Probably because it was written by Charles Dickens, who was a quintessentially British author, and the story takes place in Victorian England, don’t you think?
@@SongOfEire Yes, Obviously. That's why I said "even Americanized version". There's no need to "Americanize" a story written by an American, Don't ya think.
My favorite version of A Christmas Carol was the one with George C. Scott as Ebenezer Scrooge.
Growing up in Indiana, we also opened one gift Christmas Eve.
because that's the Indian way, don't spill the beans, fool
We also opened one gift on
Christmas Eve.
In Maine one pres on C Eve
we would open all the gifts from each other on Christmas eve, and then the next morning we would open the gifts from Santa and eat the candy from our stocking after breakfast on Christmas morning.
As an adult I asked my mom why we did it that way and was told that as kids, her family had such a tiny house and such a big family that there wasn't room for gifts from each other AND the gifts from Santa at the same time.
We still do it that way tho
In Indiana we opened all ours around 5 or 6 in the morning and our stockings are filled with goodys candy nuts fruit candy canes but my mother and fathetwere actually born in Chicago dad was born in1907 and his parents were polish and my mom was born in 1918 and her father was Scottish and her mother was Norwegian and in truth all my brothers and sisters were born in Chicago we lived on a farm animals are taken care of in the evening and morning
I applaud you for embracing our country. Does my heart good. Thanks
My people came from London England 1911 and they always had fruitcake at Christmas🎄... I love fruitcake with my hot cup of tea ☕ and we always have ham for 🎄Christmas dinner ...The movie Die Hard I think is only a Christmas movie from a mans perspective us women like a good story🎄and the Hallmark channels have many good ones...wishing You Both 🎄⛄Merry Christmas and a Blessed and Happy New Year 🍷🍷🎉🎉🎉
Opening a present on Christmas eve is definitely a tradition that I've carried on for my own kid.
In my family our tradition is not having a tradition. So, year to year its a different thing. One year we opened presents on Christmas Eve. Another year we had a massive Christmas lunch and then opened gifts. My dad is bi polar so his mind never quite settled on a tradition. It's actually okay, I have friends who never experienced any other tradition(s) because they've always did another. For me, I had the chance to try them all. I like the comforts, big piping cup of hot cocoa, fleece blanket, family gathered, and we watch a Christmas movie. To me, that's as close as I can come to a tradition that hasn't died or lost it's magic and lustre.
We don't necessarily have a tradition or do the exact same thing each year in my family but one tradition we do have that I love is pyjamas on Christmas eve. I don't mind doing something different each year so long as I get my pyjamas and my whole family together.
You two look so CUTE in your Christmas outfits🎄- festive music & playful couple 'bickering'😁💓!!
So I’m from Tennessee, 47 & had a fairly basic Christmas- no cookies, or stockings or extras but unusually- we had home Christmas on the eve and Christmas Day was always at my grandparents house for potluck with about 40 first cousins- 18 aunt and uncles and we each also had a gift from them under their tree.
Good times
But since I didn’t ever have a lot of the traditions- I started them up with all my own kids- such as making cookies, setting them out, stockings, Christmas lights and etc....
And I made sure they got to wake up Christmas morning and unwrap at home and we make breakfast/brunch Christmas Day foods to munch on- particularly anything appetiser style.
Although both sweaters are great, I especially like Laurence's, as I'm a Star Wars fan.
We always went to the Christmas Eve candlelight service and when we got home, we would each pick a present to open that night. Christmas Day, we open all the other presents and stockings
The big thing on Christmas Eve, from when I was a kid until now, was to go to midnight mass. It was the biggest, splashiest, most wonderful mass of the year. Even people who don't go to church go to midnight mass. The hymns and pageantry are amazing.
Our newer traditions since I was dating and got married have been to open gifts on Christmas Eve. (I'm not my mother, so I can't cook all day and enjoy Christmas!)
I don't think many do enjoy slaving for days prepping for an afternoon of eating, they do it for their family not themselves
One of my favourite Christmas movies is Love Actually. Another I love is Joyeaux Noel, based on the Christmas truces in the trenches in 1914.
We each opened one small gift on Christmas Eve after church. I grew up in Miami, Florida.
Christmas Carol is the classic an both sides. As an American "A Wonderful Life" , " Miracle on 34th", the "Grinch Stole Christmas". I
We always went to church. We opened gifts Christmas Day.
When we were kids we used to open one present on Christmas Eve. In retrospect, I now realize this was a clever ploy on my parents' part, as the presents we opened were specifically designed to keep us quiet in the car on the (short but crowded with various other relations who'd come to stay) drive to my aunt and uncle's house the next morning. We don't have any family close by or able to visit us anymore, so now we just stay up insanely late, roll out of bed around ten, throw the turkey in the oven and open presents whenever. I miss having extended family close by, but there's a lot to be said for having no schedule and no obligations for Christmas. Not least of which, no one has to have ham.
Turkey? Odd. Turkey is exclusively reserved for Thanksgiving for my family and then we ate Ham for Christmas.
@@landon3573 We did ham when I was a kid, but when I hit my teenage years and took over the cooking, it emerged that my dad was the only one in the entire family, nuclear or extended, who actually *liked* ham... so when he lit out for greener pastures we decided we'd never do ham again. It probably helps that I make a damn good turkey - there have been minor fisticuffs over the leftovers.
In England, most meat eaters eat turkey for their Christmas Dinner.
We always opened one small present on Christmas Eve when I was growing up. I've continued to follow that tradition with my two littles
In the English story A Child’s Christmas in Wales the child gets one gift on Christmas Eve. I am from Canada. Our heritage is English. Our traditions are a mix of each culture. Essentially we do it all.
That "deer in the headlights" look you got when your wife is talking and finishing your sentences is universal. And not just on Christmas.
The Christmas season started Thanksgiving day for us. We had meal at grandparents, men watched football, grandma and kids went to den and kids decorate tree. Christmas Eve day again went to grandparents. We also got PJs and got to open a small gift Christmas Eve. Nice to know was a tradition among other families...BTW grandparents lived in NC
Christmas Eve was tamales with the extended family at my great-aunt's place. We'd also leave cookies out for Santa (homemade was ideal, but storebought worked in a pinch) and carrots and oats for the reindeer. Mustn't forget them!
Christmas Day Santa would have filled our stockings, plus left one gift (unwrapped so we knew it was from him!). We could open and play with those until parents woke up. Then it was gifts at home before going to grandma's for celebrating with family. More stockings, a special breakfast we only got on Christmas, more gifts, and holiday dinner at about 3pm (we pretty much had a formulaic holiday dinner based around turkey that we ate at Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Easter and is pretty close to the classic turkey Thanksgiving dinner).
My grandmother (my Dad's mum) made the most amazing mince pies (she made the best flaky pie crusts). They were mostly raisins and sweet bits. We also opened one gift on Christmas Eve, and our stockings were hung at the foot of our beds to appease us for 10 minutes on Christmas morning so that we would not wake the parents before 6 am. You two are adorable. Season's Greetings and lots of love and health to you both!.
I grew up in the US. We opened a single present each on Christmas Eve. My mother always chose it. It was ALWAYS pajamas. I was in high school or university one Xmas, and my mother handed my older sister and I our box. We exclaimed “yay! New pajamas” before opening it. Our mother was aghast. “How did you know?” Lol. Every year, Ma. Every year.
Just stumbled across you channel and chose it because of Tarik’s look. Love the glasses. Love the sweaters. The uniqueness of you both. I think you’re hilarious! Your facts and figures are really interesting.
We opened all presents on Christmas Eve and it was a feast of hors d’oeuvres and then Christmas morning we would get our stockings with small gifts
Christmas Tradition-- Gouging of the candles..when we were young my grandma worked at a candle factory and would give us decorative candle figurines. one year the face of one got scratched so there was a revenge scratching of the other's candle---- this degraded into completely gouging the faces off of both candles--- and the tradition occasionally resurfaces... and the wax piles of choir boys, snowmen and elves (now de-faced) get lit, melted and tossed. Merry Psychopath-mas.
As I grew older, we started opening up one, then two presents on Christmas Eve. Our stockings contained smallish presents but also fruits and nuts. We also drove around looking at decorations and Dad knew what neighborhoods were best.
By the time I was a teenager we had worn my mother down and ended up opening ALL of the presents on Christmas Eve. Christmas Day we usually go to the movie theatre to see the latest must see movie.
Christmas Eve pre-presents we have a big family dinner.
We had Christmas Eve at my Aunt & Uncle’s house. It was dinner and and visiting with relatives that included my Uncle’s parents and siblings. We would then go to church. After church we returned to my Aunt & Uncle’s house and opened gifts (that is when my cousins got their biggest haul). Cookies would be put out for Santa that night before bed. Then Christmas morning my sister and I got our stockings which included fruit and some candies like kisses or foil wrapped chocolate ornaments. Then the big celebration was at our house. This was all the great aunts & uncles, my mother and aunt’s parents plus cousins, I mean there had to be 20+ people. There were hors d’oeuvers drinks and then we got to open presents. Then playing, conversation and dinner.
Must-see Christmas films (a short list): A Christmas Carol (Alastair Sim), It's a Wonderful Life, The Snowman (Based on the Raymond Briggs' book), A Child's Christmas in Wales, A Charlie Brown Christmas, Miracle on 34th Street, and Babes in Toyland (Laurel & Hardy),
Home Alone Mr Grinch Rudulof and Frosty and Elf
I also like The Bishops Wife, with Cary Grant ane A Christmas Wish wirh Jimmy Durante.
We would have a stocking with some Quality Street, chocolate coins, orange 🍊 apple 🍏 and nuts, with a small toy. We use to have our presents at the foot of the bed. We had a holly tree as a Christmas Tree with small candles not lights. The tree was put up the Sunday before Christmas and Father Christmas 🎄 put up the decorations. Not like today when they are put up weeks in advance, but ours never came down before 12th night, the 6th. January.
We got a package Christmas Eve too. It was always PJs. And we got to a concert and Nutcracker every year too. We also make cookies, but not the night before as we give them out to all our friends/teachers/etc. I was surprised to hear how similar our traditions were!!
After opening gifts in the morning we went sledding, then came home for Christmas dinner and played games till late in the evening.
As a German American (a German tradition) is to open all our gifts on Christmas eve and then go to church.
We opened one gift on Christmas Eve and then attended "candlelight sevice" at church. Both of my parents were from Scandinavian families.
Just like the Queen. A lot of UK traditons are german dating back to Prince Albert.
@@csuderburg8389
This is what we do.
I'm part German. We did the same thing.
i always wonder why my family opened all our gifts Christmas eve..... my last name is German... thanks for the heads up.