15 Masa'il 164 B.E. - Wednesday, December 26, 2007 about 6:27 AM PST
December 26 the day after Christmas, the first day of Kwanzaa, either the first day of Christmas or the second day (depending on the tradition followed), and Boxing Day in Canada; for my Grandmother it was the day she began taking down the Christmas decorations. Some leave the Christmas decorations up until after New Year's Day, but my Grandma Newland always began taking them down on December 26.
The first thing to come down was the Christmas tree. For years Grandma would decorate a real fur tree. On Black Friday, Grandpa would take us Christmas tree shopping. He would buy a tree, take it home and then we would decorate it. On the day after Christmas, the tree came down and the decorations were stored in Grandma's walk in closet until next year.
Grandpa would take the tree out to the alley, put it in a large metal trashcan and burn it. There were no restrictions about burning trash like that at the time. After the tree completely burned, he put the ashes out using water. Then we began talking down the rest of the decorations in the house. Even after Grandma bought an artificial tree, one of the silver metal ones, she still took the decorations down on December 26.
After taking down and putting away the Christmas decorations, she began her New Year's preparations. This meant some house cleaning less then spring cleaning, but enough to make sure there were no stray pieces of popcorn strings in the living room. This is also when the baking began. Grandma made her pies ahead, then defrosted and warmed them on New Year's Day.
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