Christmas in Sweden

The last Sunday in November the shops in Sweden has Skyltsondag. That means: Shop Window Sunday. Then the Christmas sale begins. The shops are open on that Sunday and they show the nice decorated store windows and there are several kind of arrangements.

Eh ....... in the beginning of November they were already selling Christmas decoration in the shops! They will start earlier every year. Oh , poor Santa! ; - )

On the Advent Sunday we begin the decoration. In the homes they light the electric candles. This candle is called "Adventstake" and it has seven lamps.. We also have Advent stars in the windows with a little electric light. 

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We have red poinsettias and hyacinths as Advent and Christmas flowers. 

We don’t decorate all the Christmas things at Advent. We decorate some days before Christmas. But in the shops and the working places they decorate all the things. We have Christmas trees with electric lights indoors and outdoors. The trees indoors will be decorated close to Christmas. The trees outdoors mostly have white lights, not so much coloured lights. On Advent Sunday many people go to the church and they light  a lot of candles.

There are both artificial and real Christmas trees. Many people in Sweden buy a real Christmas tree. Salesmen are selling Christmas trees on several places in the town. People who have forest of their own can go and cut a tree of thier own.. Or you can cut a tree if you get permission of the land owner. The tree is placed in a Christmas tree stand that must be filled with water. Then you can keep the tree in your house until after the Twelfth Day. At many official places they have artificial trees, it is better for the people who are allergic.

Lucia Day is on December 13. A woman or a little girl is dressed as Lucia. She has a white dress and a red silk ribbon round her waist, and a crown with candle lights in her hair.. She has to walk very slowly because of the lights, and in accordance with the tradition Lucia have to advance slowly. The woman, Lucia, must have something underneath the crown to avoid that the stearin will drip in her hair. There are also Lucia crowns with electric candles (with batteries) That is more safe and better for children who will be Lucia. Lucia does not come alone. She is in a Lucia procession. She has maidens with her. Those girls are also dressed in white. And they have tinsel in their hair. And there are boys who are dressed in white with high pointed white hats with stars on them. These hats are called for a "strut" in Swedish (cone). These boys are called for "star boys." The star boys are carrying a star on e pin in their hands. In the Lucia procession there are also people dressed as Santa Claus and as gingerbread cookies. In the homes Lucia and her attendants come to the people with a tray coffee and cakes on it. There are gingerbread cookies in the form of a heart. And cakes that are named "lussekatter". It is a cake with raisin and saffron. Lucia and her attendants are singing "Santa Lucia". It is common to have a Lucia procession in schools, hospitals and working places .

Christmas is very ceremonious and filled with traditions. On -December 24, 25 and 26 we are free from our work. December 24 we celebrate "julafton" then we begin to celebrate our Christmas. We begin in the afternoon with watching Walt Disney films with Donald Duck. This was for the children but it became a tradition, and now adults are also watching it. And they show these movies every year. And this is very popular. The hour Donald Duck is in TV nobody is out. It is quiet in town. In the north of Sweden it is dark at 3 o’ clock in the afternoon when the Donald Duck begins. And it is nice and cosy with the candles and the movies on TV.

After TV watching we eat our Christmas dinner. And there are a lot of small dishes. The most important dish is the ham. You boil it in a big saucepan. Or you boil it in the oven in aluminium foil. I use to do it in the oven. After it you take care of the pan gravy of the ham. More dishes are liver paste, smoker reindeer meat, salad of red beets, several kinds of pickles herring, sugar-salted salmon, veal brawn, hard boiled egg cut in 2 pieces and a shrimp on the egg and dried smoked sheep. To the ham you take a little apple sauce and you can take little mustard on the slice of ham. That are the cold dishes.

 

The warm dishes are: Small meatballs, small sausages, and Janssons Frestelse. That is potatoes cut in very thin sticks, cream, onion and Swedish anchovy. You cook this in the oven. And ”lutfisk”. That is dried stockfish that you treat in lye. You have to soak it and boil it. You have salt and white sauce with black pepper on it. That fish does not taste anything. It is the sauce that tastes. I never use to have stockfish on my Christmas table. And you don’t need to have all the dishes on your table. But ham is the most important thing you must have. We use to save the gravy of the ham to dip bread in. You use to have a bread flavoured with wort to dip in the pot. In Norrland we have "tunnbr�rd" instead of wort bread. Turkey is not a Swedish tradition.

After the dinner we give each other the Christmas presents. The parcels are under the Christmas tree and sometimes Santa Claus is coming. But mostly it is one in the family who take one parcel and reads the label and give it to the person whose name is on the label.

After we got our presents we can watch TV or read the new present book and drink coffee with ginger cookies. Christmas eve is celebrated in the homes and nobody is outside and there are not so much buses going.

 On Christmas day you can go to the church to a service that in Swedish is called "Julotta" That Christmas service is very early in the morning.

At Christmas eve you can dance around the Christmas tree and then sing children Christmas songs. We never do that home. But in older times they had very big family Christmas  celebration in the farms and then they were dancing around the Christmas tree. But nowadays It is most on children’s play houses or in town with public arrangement they do it. On Christmas day and the second Christmas day we are taking it easy. We are enjoying your presents and you eat more of the Christmas food. Many people celebrate Christmas with relatives.

After Christmas there are a lot of people in the shops. Mostly to change the presents that not fit or presents they got in several copies. :- )


Santa Claus and Santa Mother
Gun and Fred Lindgren
 

Sleighride, a favourite Christmas Memory

My Christmas poem

Christmas links of others
Christmas in Norway

Sonjas julsida

Senior Spin - Articles - Holidays

Wilhelmina Schedin 2016-03-09


We also read the bible
and read  Christmas  stories