First off, happy New Year to all my readers! But since we're still technically in the 12 days of Christmas, here's a quick Christmas post...
Christmas time always brings out the German heritage in me...as a kid, we always had a pickle ornament hanging on our tree that our parents hid and my siblings and I had to find it. It's an old German tradition and it was always a fun part of Christmas day, trying to find the pickle. Sometimes the person who finds it is supposed to get an extra present, or get to open an extra present, or supposed to get good luck in the coming year...in my house, we got to lord it over our siblings that we were the "winner." I come from a family that has been in the United States for so long that we don't have a lot of Old World traditions that have been handed down or that we practice, so I always enjoyed this little piece of my German ancestry.
I actually bought a pickle ornament this year and I had my husband and 3 year old daughter look for it. He found it right away...she couldn't find it even though it was right in front of her face. It was still fun, though, and I look forward to carrying forward this German tradition and passing down to my children something from my own childhood, and from our German family history.
What Christmas traditions do you and your family have that come from your cultural or ethnic background?
Can you find the pickle ornament in the Christmas tree??