What will Paula be Blogging for Christmas?

Last Christmas, I did Blog Days of Christmas for the month of December. By the time I reached Christmas Day, I was so over it.

However, m usual Grinchiness as a blogger runs smack dab into cyber-Whoville around this time of year, and I do feel compelled to blog more in the month of December about Christmas. However, since I'm on deadline, I can't promise I'll be posting every day. I am, however, going to post more this month. And there's no telling what the topic might be or whether or not it actually has a bloody thing to do with Christmas.

However, I'll promise you this: Santapalooza is coming! December 20th - 24th, I'll be posting all sorts of Christmas related things every day, with chances to win prizes included! Why, I believe my heart has grown three sizes just thinking about it! ;)

Tell your friends to watch for Santapalooza. If don't follow my blog, click the little "follow" button and you can get email reminders on the days I blog so you don't miss a thing, including chances to win great prizes! (And as you know, I don't blog a lot, so you're not exactly going to be bombarded with emails from me).

Talk to y'all soon!

I'm Dreaming (Futilely) of a White Christmas, plus contest

As I was writing this blog post ahead of time, about a week ago, I had no idea that, ironically, this post would fall on the first snow of this season. It wasn't much; we have a very pretty dusting of snow on the ground and the trees outside. But snow is snow, and for what it's worth, there's some of the cold white stuff on the ground outside. But will there be a white Christmas here?

Unlikely.

I know I'm going to lose you northerners with this one, but here's the bittersweet truth about Christmas in the South: it almost never snows. In fact, the only reason I included the word "almost" is that I suppose it's remotely possible that somewhere, in some hilly hamlet of the South, it might have snowed on Christmas once in the last fifty years. But as a rule? Nope. No snow on Christmas if you live in the deep South.

Contrary to what today's weather situation might suggest, we rarely get snow at all. There's today's dusting. And we had about a half an inch here in central Alabama earlier this year; I even blogged about it. But there have been many years where we didn't see a flake. But snow is generally localized--you might get a band of heavy rain that hits just when the temperatures are low enough to produce snow, but it's never widespread, it's extremely rare, and it usually melts within hours.

Down here in the South, we get ragged a lot about not being able to cope with snow. Whole cities shut down even with an inch or so of the white stuff. But in our defense, snow of any significance is so rare that trying to prepare the city for dealing with snow would be cost-inefficient. Why buy snow tires or snow chains when you almost never get snow? Why purchase and maintain snow plows when there's never any snow to plow? And how on earth could a Southerner hone his snow driving skills when he can go years without seeing a single flake?

One of these days, maybe, if I live long enough, I'll see it snow on Christmas here in Alabama.

I'm just not holding my breath.

Does it snow for Christmas where you live ? Do you have any White Christmas stories? Share them with the rest of us.I'm going to randomly choose one commenter on this blog post to win a $10 Barnes and Noble gift card, so get to posting!


UPDATED:

Here's what our dusting looked like this morning:

If you're wondering what that tangle of vines is there in the bottom of the photo, that's what's left of last summer's tomato plants, left to go fallow over the winter. You can see a small orangish ball at the bottom right—that's a marigold bloom covered with a crust of snow.

Top 5 Most Interesting U.S. Christmas Traditions, Plus Contest

I think I've blogged before about how non-traditional my family is about Christmas, despite being religious and conservative. I think it's really that we're pretty no-fuss people, and celebrations get so elaborate and complicated.

But I do enjoy hearing about other people's traditions. So I did a little research about Christmas traditions in the United States, just to see what other Americans were doing for the Christmas season.

So without further delay, my Top 5 Most Interesting Christmas Traditions in America, in no particular order:

1. Las Posadas - New Mexico and Arizona



This 9-day celebration (Dec. 16th through Christmas Eve) commemorates the Biblical journey Mary and Joseph made to Bethlehem, and their search for a place to stay. The event includes a candle-lit procession and a colorful pageant that usually features the children of the town, and culminates in a big feast on Christmas Eve.

More information on Las Posadas can be found here, here and here.

3. Reveillon - New Orleans

Reveillon, or "awakening" in French, was a Creole custom, borrowed from their French ancestors. After a day of religious fasting on Christmas Eve, the Creoles would come home from Midnight Mass and enjoy an elaborate feast to break the fast. The feast would go on through the night, ending in the early morning hours.

Though it's not celebrated the same way today, since not as many people observe religious fasts, many local New Orleans restaurants still offer Reveillon dinners during the Christmas season.
More here.

4. Christmas Luau - Hawaii

Mele Kalikimaka! The greeting is actually a Hawaiianization of the English "Merry Christmas," which the natives apparently had trouble pronouncing when Christian missionaries introduced the tradition to the islands back in the 1800s.

While most of Hawaii's Christmas Traditions were introduced by the Christian missionaries who arrived there in the 1800s, there was a New Year's festival already celebrated there by the natives, called Makahiki. When the holiday was Christianized to include Christmas, many of the food traditions of the holiday became part of the Hawaiian Christmas tradition.

5. The Mummers Parade - New Year's Day - Philadelphia



Though technically, this is a New Year's Day tradition, it comes out of a Swedish tradition of "Second Day Christmas," featuring post-Christmas visits to friends. The custom expanded to include New Year's Day as well, including a noisy and colorful parade to welcome the new year. There's a good history of the celebration here.

For Philadelphia, the Mummers Parade is as significant and distinctive as Mardi Gras is to New Orleans.

So, how about y'all? What are some of your favorite holiday traditions, here in the US or wherever you live? Please post all about them in the comments and share a little Christmas spirit with the rest of us. Or, if you celebrate a different holiday, like Hannukah, around this time of year, tell us about those traditions as well.

Need the pot sweetened a little bit? I'm going to select one lucky commenter to win a copy of Carla Cassidy's Scene of the Crime: Bridgewater, Texas, which I featured on yesterday's blog post.

So get to commenting!

Welcome to the Blog Days of Christmas

For twenty-five days straight (I hope!), I plan to blog about Christmas traditions, songs, foods and memories. I'm also going to highlight the six fabulous Harlequin Intrigues available this month and tell you a little about the stories and the authors.

From time to time, I'll post a "Five" list--such as "Five Cheesiest Christmas songs," "Five favorite Christmas foods," and "Five favorite Christmas movies." I hope you'll chime in with your favorites as well.

Also I'll be giving away prizes, including Amazon.com gift certificates, free books, Barnes and Noble gift cards and more!

So please, join me for the Blog Days of Christmas, and be sure to tell your friends!

Plus, don't forget that today's the day that CASE FILE: CANYON CREEK, WYOMING goes on sale at eHarlequin.com. Order your copy today!