Categories: History

Weird December 2010 Holidays: Week 4

This is a continuum from previous articles. If you want to see the December holidays for week 1, week 2, and week 3, visit here , here, and here (respectively).

22. National Date Nut Bread Day: There was very little information about this holiday. But this was the actually only one I could find for December 22nd. So grab a slice of this moist, dense bread and enjoy.

23. Roots Day: It is during the holidays that most of us suffer through, I mean, enjoy extra family time. It is only fitting that December is the month with a holiday to encourage learning about our backgrounds. Take the time on December 23rd to discover something new about your family’s past. If you haven’t already, today would be a good day to start a family tree.

24. Christmas Eve: In case you didn’t know…. Christmas Eve is the day before Christmas. Surprised? Many people have family traditions that take place on Christmas Eve. When I was younger, I was always allowed to open a single present on this night. There are many traditional Christmas Eve meals that take place on the 24th – Italian Catholics eat 7 types of seafood on Christmas Eve. And in the Czech Republic and Slovakia, the Christmas Eve meal consists of a fish soup with potato salad and breaded roasted carp.
National Eggnog Day: I look forward to eggnog season all year long. I’m so glad to know that eggnog has it’s own day for recognition. Back in the day, eggnog was an upper class drink. The ingredients for eggnog were expensive, so only the upper class people got to enjoy it. Now, eggnog is widely known, with many different versions of the drink. In Germany, they have an eggnog-like “soup” that they mix with beer. There is another eggnog soup in Iceland that contains no alcohol. In Europe, the alcohol of choice with eggnog is white wine. And in the United States and Canada, eggnog is often mixed with rum or bourbon.

See also Cherokee Myth About the Sun

25. Christmas: I’m going to go out on a limb and guess that you’ve heard of Christmas. So I will stick with a couple interesting facts. The song “Jingle Bells” was originally written for Thanksgiving, but was later changed to “Christmas song. The first state to officially recognize Christmas as a holiday was Alabama. And in Ukraine, a spider web found inside the house on Christmas day means good luck.
National Pumpkin Pie Day: Some people might dislike me after I say this, but I do not like pumpkin pie. To all the pumpkin pie lovers out there, I’m sorry! However, I think it’s wonderful that such a well-known and generally loved food can have a day all to it’s own.

26. National Candy Cane Day: The first historical reference of candy canes was from 1670, when a German choirmaster bent sugar sticks into a cane shape, but the first historical reference of candy canes in American is from 1847. It was about 50 years after that that the candy canes were made with red stripes.
National Thank You Note Day: Time to show gratitude for all the gifts received. The day after Christmas is a great day to start in order to keep from procrastinating.

27. National Fruitcake Day: It’s time get started on all those scrumptious fruitcakes passed around. According to a 2005 survey, almost 80% of Americans say that a fruitcake is the worst holiday gift to receive. And the people most responsible for giving out fruitcakes as gifts? According to the same survey, grandparents, aunts, and uncles are most likely to give a fruitcake.

28. Holy Innocents Day: This day is to honor the children slain by Herod the Great’s order. According to the Bible, Herod wanted baby Jesus dead, and he had all the male infants in Bethlehem murdered to try to accomplish just that.

29. Pepper Pot Day: Pepper pot is a thick, spicy soup that was created by Christopher Ludwick, the Continental Army’s baker general. On December 29, 1777, he mixed the very few ingredients he had left in order to feed the hungry soldiers. Those ingredients made pepper pot soup. Some soldiers called it “the soup that won the war”.

30. National Bicarbonate of Soda Day: Sodium Bicarbonate (also known as baking soda), in the form that we know today, was created in 1971 by a french chemist, Nicolas Lablanc. However, the ancient Egyptians used natural natural deposits of sodium bicarbonate. It wasn’t until 1846 that the first baking soda factory was opened, and now people around the world use baking soda for cleaning, deodorizing, cooking and baking, and polishing. It is a very popular product indeed.

31. Make up Your Mind Day: This is the day to decide on your New Years resolutions because tomorrow begins the new year. Statistics show that about 45% of Americans make a New Years resolutions, and only about 46% of those resolutions are still maintained after 6 months. About 25% of the resolutions have “failed” within the first week. But research also shows that people who do make New Years resolutions are about 10 times more likely to succeed in their goals then those who don’t. It’s no surprise that the top resolutions are about weight loss, exercise, and smoking.