A favorite family tradition for Christmas is having get-together and playing gift games (which we have not be able to do because of covid restrictions).

My favorite Christmas carols is a tied between "Angels We Have Heard On High" and "God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen". Angels We Have Heard On High is a worshipful song of an angelic chorus. It was originally a French Carol. God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen has a deeper meaning. "Merry" was an old English word for "Mighty", as in Robin Hood and his merry men. The carol actually goes along with Revelation 12, about the woman, the child, and the red dragon, what Christ was born to do.

I think my favorite Christmas food is gingerbread. I love gingerbread cookies, gingerbread tea, gingerbread loaf, gingerbread chai, and gingerbread coffee (yes, I am a coffee drinker, though I am more of a tea person. Gingerbread tea is actually my go-to if I'm feeling nauseous).

My favorite Christmas show is A Charlie Brown Christmas. I watch it every year when it's on. I have a Charlie Brown tree set up, and a Charlie Brown Christmas mug.

So many to choose from. We don't have a whole lot up now, but we like to be festive.

Probably my best Christmas memory is when some of my extended family came out to Oregon to surprise my grandma for her 80th birthday (her birthday was December 22. She died in 2013).

I guess the funniest Christmas memories is when we had the 70's Christmas, and my uncle did a 70's disco dance.

This year I am doing an advent calendar with different teas for each day. It might be the best gift I got this year.

Not sure what I most want for Christmas. I think it is for everyone to be safe during covid.

It's been a busy few weeks for me recently, so I'm glad you remembered the thread , @Courtenay! 

@Jasmine, I had no idea about the origin of the word 'merry.' That is so cool! 

 One of my favorite Christmas traditions has been going to hear our local symphony orchestra perform a free concert of Christmas Carols in a massive cathedral-style church. I'm not sure we'll do it this year, due to packed schedules, but the concert in recent years has been one of the highlights of the Christmas season for me. I love hearing a massive orchestra anytime, but I also enjoy the stainglass windows and the overall medieval feel of the building- makes me think a bit about Christmas liturgies of centuries past. 

Hooray, my favorite thread of the year.  

What is your favourite Christmas tradition? Decorating the tree the day after Thanksgiving, stockings on Christmas morning, or the random gifting that happens at our home during December because someone just can't wait any longer to give a gift.

What is your favourite Christmas carol / song / piece of music? What Child Is This?; Hark The Herald Angels Sing (with the fourth verse); Immanuel, Unto Us A Son Is Given, Thou The Promise, and We Will Find Him by Michael Card; Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silent; Come, Thou Long Expected Jesus; O Come, O Come Emmanuel; He Who Is Mighty, One Still Night, Prepare Him Room, Hope of the Ages, and Come For Us by Sovereign Grace Music. It's hard to pick one.  

What is your favourite Christmas food? Sugar cookies, peppernuts, or dark chocolate fudge.

What is your favourite Christmas movie or TV show episode? Top five movies: Stalag 17 (1953), Battleground (1949), We're No Angels (1955), Fitzwilly (1967), and Never Say Goodbye (1946). TV show episodes: Scarecrow and Mrs. King's The Long Christmas Eve (S1 E10) and The Six Million Dollar Man's A Bionic Christmas Carol (S4 E10).

What is your favourite Christmas decoration? I'm not good at picking a favorite, but I love our Precious Moments Nativity set, all of our bright shiny Christmas ornaments, and colored lights.

What is your best Christmas memory? My favorites are classified.  

What was the best Christmas gift you have ever received? I've received many wonderful gifts. Among my favorites are the hats I been given over the years, I completely wore one of them out and had to get rid of it this year. But I still have several lovely hats that have a lot of wear left in them.  

What do you most want for Christmas this year? Oh, I hate this question, to answer with something material sounds trivial, but on the other hand this thread is not the place for a deep theological discussion and I am not very good at those. So, the trivial answer is Mannix seasons 1-3, a black eyelet newsboy cap, and anything purple.  

SnowAngel

It's been 24 hours, so here I am again. I forgot to mention in my previous post that I am enjoying this Advent devotional series from Apologia Studios. I love that Jeff Durbin started the series in Genesis.

SnowAngel

@jasminetarkheena 
Sorry to rain on your parade, but I checked it with snopes, and merry does not, and did not, mean mighty. Here's a link to a full explanation of this and other false stories about Christmas:

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/god-rest-ye-merry-gentlemen/

It simply means, "May God keep you merry, gentlemen." i.e. have a merry Christmas.

I love this song too. I learned it, believe it or not, from my friend next door when I was growing up; she had been given an old wind-up gramophone/phonograph, with about 3 old "78" records. One was this carol!

Posted by: @coracle

@jasminetarkheena 
Sorry to rain on your parade, but I checked it with snopes, and merry does not, and did not, mean mighty.

That's so interesting coracle. I too had heard of Merry being a sort-of synonym to Mighty. I did a quick search and found it here....
https://billygraham.org/devotion/what-does-merry-mean/

And then I read your Snopes link, and as I'm suspect of pretty much all sources of info these days, I looked up the etymology of the word myself. At least on the internet, it looks like Snopes is correct. I couldn't find any reference to the word meaning "mighty." 

At any rate, I've been slowly getting all of my remaining gifts purchased or ordered and I've even managed to wrap a few things. 🙂 

15 days to Christmas. This month is flying by!

Regarding "God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen," I'd not heard the "mighty" usage before, and had always understood it to be an archaic usage of "rest," as snopes describes.

Coincidentally, just days ago a friend posted a humorous Youtube video which explores just where that comma goes.

@stargazer thanks for the hilarious video!

12 Days until Christmas!

So far, I've managed to watch Disney's A Christmas Carol. I think that's the only Christmas movie I've watched, although I have been watching Hawkeye.  

The soundtrack to my holiday season this year is the album Christmas Land by Derek and Brandon Feichter.

Also, I'm excited to be able to say that yesterday I made a long-awaited purchase of... orchestra sleigh bells! I'm not sure what I'm going to do with them yet, but if anyone needs someone to jingle some percussion in 4/4 time, I'm ready!

After reading a FB post by one of our earliest members I watched the Doctor Who Christmas special that has lots of similarities to LWW. (The Doctor, the Widow and.the Wardrobe).

Wishing all the Narniawebbers a Merry Christmas!

I finally got all of the Christmas gifts I had ordered, just have one left to wrap for my mom. I am so excited for Christmas Day. We have packages scattered all over the house on top of bookcases.

We need to finalize our Christmas Day menu. We are for sure having brisket and some kind of potatoes. The parents want to have cranberry jello salad, so that's probably going to be on the menu as well.

I made some vanilla wafers yesterday, they are one of my must make in for December/Christmas cookies. I changed the sweetener that I used and the wafers were soft, so I think I will have to make them again. Do to the busyness of December thus far, we are planning to do our Christmas sugar cookies on the 26th. 

SnowAngel

Greetings from the Pacific Northwest! I'm visiting family and my mother here for the first time in almost 2 years.

I've shared this video elsewhere in the past, but recently the TV station aired this updated version.

It's about a man who has decorated a large tree in his yard with over 45,000 lights for the holidays. Thanks to its rural setting, it can be seen from some distance. It's also right next to one of the busiest highways in Minnesota.

It has sentimental value to me, as it is on the way to my parents' former home in southern Minnesota, and marked an unofficial halfway point on the trip. Its beauty was always a joy to see, and I'm glad he's continuing the tradition.

That's so cool, stargazer! It's always great when someone goes all out like that.

  In my own neighborhood, we have a guy who puts up about a dozen inflatables (including Santa in a hot air balloon suspended from a zipline), a digital Christmas Countdown, a Christmas tree, a toy train, and a small animatronic Santa's Workshop display in a clear plastic case. It of course attracts quite a few visitors at night when it's lit.

Also, 3 Days until Christmas! 

 This season has been incredibly busy for me, what with finishing college and all. Looking forward to wrapping it up with a few days at home with the family. (And also wrapping up a staggering amount of Christmas gifts... the family keeps growing! )

If I'm not back before then, 

Merry Christmas and Long Live the True King!