So after typing that title I just realized that could be taken the wrong way. So let me explain myself.
I was doing some thinking today and was wondering what the "official" end of Christmas is. In my house, we never rush around taking the Christmas stuff down on December 26th, although I know some people do. In fact, I'm still reading a few Christmas books I didn't have time to get to before the holidays right now. I'm still listening to Christmas music. Our tree is still up and we still turn on the lights. We sang Christmas hymns in church today.
For me, I guess we really end Christmas on New Year's Eve. My family's not really into the whole partying on New Years thing, but we usually take down the tree on December 31st or January 1st. And that's about the time I put away most of my other Christmas things for the year. I guess that I spend so many days thinking about Christmas that the excitement just seems too big to be contained in the single December 25th day.
So how about you? When does your Christmas end?
9 comments:
We're Christmas-prolongers at our house. Sometimes...it's taken too far. I remember one year we still had our tree up at Valentine's Day, and we just redecorated it with hearts. Yeah...
Mostly now we get it down a week after New Year's. It's sad though - because it's so pretty and bright with all the lights!
We never decorate for Christmas before Dec 23 and I don't take down the decorations before earliest the 13th day of Christmas. My grandmother always had Christmas until the 20th day of Christmas(old Norwegian tradition).
I don't know what the usual time is in the USA but in most of the former British empire i.e., the UK, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa etc., decorations must be taken down by 12th Night.
This dates from the middle ages I believe.
"Twelfth Night, the 5th of January, has been celebrated as the end of the Christmas season since the Middle Ages. One of the most important days in the Christian calendar, Twelfth Night also marked the Feast of the Epiphany, when the three wise men, or Magi, arrived in Bethlehem to behold the Christ child."
Carol
Here in the Philippines, Christmas ends on the Feast of the Three Kings, which I think is on the first Sunday of January. :)
Hi, We're Catholic and Christmas also ends for us on Epiphany or Twelfth Night, the arrival of the 3 Wise Men.
We celebrate Advent during December and don't start celebrating Christmas until the last week before Christmas Eve when we decorate the tree and prepare for Christmas Eve Mass.
Officialy Christmas ends for my the seventh of january, when I got back to school.. but we take our time to remove all the decorations.. one year I thought that we were going to leave them there for the next Christmas!
Christmas usually ends New Years Eve. We get ready to celebrate the new year then and on to bigger and better things..We hope.,.LOL
My family is like yours, where we take down all the Christmas decorations around New Years. We stop listening to Christmas music on the 26th, though, because usually we're already sick of it by then!
We usually tak our tree down the first week of the new year, but the lights might stay up a while, just not turned on
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