Advent Calendar: School Celebrations in Rural Mississippi and Germany

I have decided to focus mostly on my dad’s side of the family for these posts since my maternal grandmother is already covering that side of the family.

I really enjoyed listening to my grandma Katie tell me how her town celebrated Christmas at school. It felt particularly significant once I made the connection that her memories speak of a time before integration.

She grew up in a rural area of Mississippi during the thirties and forties. School celebrations turned into town celebrations inviting everyone to participate. Each family would contribute a few items to the after school party to make for a wonderful gathering. My grandmother’s family liked to bring pecan pies and cookies. Her brothers would climb up the pecan trees and shake the branches until pecans rained down upon the girls below. The girls would then pick up all the pecans and carry them home. At night they would stay up and shell the pecans, so their mother could bake with them during the day. My grandmother's mom (aunt) would chop all the nuts and turn them into delicious treats. They even grew their own peanuts, which they would make peanut brittle with and take to the party.

At the party everyone enjoyed the many delicious Christmas delicacies but the real fun was in the socializing. They participated in several different types of competitive games led by the teacher. They played games like potato sack race, family
board games, and this game where they would have to push an egg from one point to another with their noses. Apparently, games like the egg game were mostly for the boys because the girls were decked out in beautiful dresses. These dresses were handmade and consisted of very heavy fabric. In the absence of polyester, they would use a special kind of brocade silk and cotton to make beautiful winter dresses to adorn the girls with for this special occasion.

As for me, my earliest memories of school holiday celebrations are from my time living in Germany. We would celebrate Sankt Nikolaus day in early December. We would listen to the story of Sankt Nikolaus and leave our shoes lined up in the school hallway. Later when we went to get our shoes Sankt Nikolaus would have filled our shoes with candy and trinkets.

As I got older school holidays were getting phased out, so I don’t have too many memories of school holiday celebrations. I do remember that some of the schools I went to had a special store that the kids could go into and buy presents for family members. The gifts weren’t anything extravagant and were actually on the cheap side, but it made us feel happy to pick out gifts all by ourselves.

Advent Calendar Holiday Happenings

I know I haven't posted in a while, but I have decided to do this advent calendar thingy that my grandma told me about. Whatever gets me blogging, right? Basically, I am supposed to blog about a specific topic everyday until Christmas. I'm already starting 15 days late, so I'm already doing too well with this blogging commitment.

We have two birthdays that fall particularly close to major holidays in my family. Most of the time these birthdays don't receive the full celebration that others do, but in the last few years greater effort has been made to not let these birthdays get lost in the holiday shuffle.

My paternal grandmother celebrates both her anniversary and birthday in December. I think her birthday probably gets overshadowed most since it is on the 22nd of December. Her birthday usually gets swallowed by Christmas. Last year I spent my first year in Arizona since high school. My husband and I took that opportunity to visit my grandparents and see my grandmother on her birthday. My grandmother's excitement really showed throughout the day. I have to say my grandma looks so young and beautiful for her age and really radiates when she is in a happy smiling mood. We gave her a fun little game that we all played together a few times, which is sort of our thing. I am really glad that we took that opportunity to celebrate her birthday last year because I'm not there to celebrate it now. Being there for her birthday made me realize how time is flying by faster than I can even count. My grandmother is in her mid 70's, but in my mind she was always in her late 60's. Although I keep getting older, for some reason, I stopped my grandparents from aging about 5 years ago. I guess when I went off to college I sort of stopped the clock on everything that was happening back home.

My birthday happens to be the other holiday birthday. It usually falls around or on Thanksgiving. That has always been a really tough thing for me to deal with. Having my birthday on a holiday meant that I didn't get taken out to eat for a special birthday dinner or my own family gathering. We always had to celebrate my birthday on Thanksgiving, which meant that most people forgot about my birthday. It wasn't until my first year of marriage that we truly honored my birthday on a day other than Thanksgiving. I have to say, it is much nicer celebrating Thanksgiving day as Thanksgiving day, instead of trying to cram in birthday celebrations as well. Plus, turkey tastes much better without the existential crisis that accompanies age :)

Anyone else have holiday birthdays? How do you celebrate? I know some people don't put up the Christmas tree until after all the birthdays are out of the way. Other people celebrate the half birthday.