5 days to Christmas and we have come to Week 3 of The Christmas Advent Challenge tag brought to us by the girls at What's In My Bag and Consigli di Makeup. You can read the first two posts for this challenge on The Perfect Red and Love, Hate and Wish products. This week we´re talking Christmas Mood, including all the decorations and traditions of Christmas. As I mentioned before, for me these holidays will be a bit different because I am not going back to Italy to spend it with my family, but I am going to celebrate with my boyfriend´s family here in The Netherlands, so let´s see how things work here.
In The Netherlands Christmas is an important holiday but is somewhat surpassed by Sinterklaas which is celebrated on December 5th. This holiday is similar to the italian San Nicoló, where people celebrate a Saint coming from far away bringing gifts to good children in the form of candies and cookies. You can read more about this tradition in this article here.
We celebrated this occasion inviting some friends at home for a typical dutch dinner with erwtensoup, a thick green pea soup with meat and other vegetables inside, and pannenkoeken (pancakes). For the occasion we decided to decorate our small home for the holiday season with the help of a good friend of ours.The theme we picked is red and silver because red is the accent color of the house decor, so these are the colors of the balls that went on the tree right outside our door.
Besides the tree, my favorite decoration is the curtain of lights we put on the front door, which you can see in the bottom right picture. It gives such a beautiful atmosphere and I'm tempted to keep it to decorate my makeup room in the next house.
One of the most curious traditions here in The Netherlands regards the exchange of gifts and it is the so called Surprise. I guess each family does it their own way, but at my boyfriends's family you have a sort of Secret Santa to whom you buy a present. Up to here all normal, but next to this present you're supposed to build something for that person with your own hands. I find it such a great way to make a present personal and since I am totally useless with wood, clay or anything crafty, I decided to bake a cake in a funny shape that is related to the present I am giving. It will be fun!! Surprise and presents will be exchanged on Christmas Eve, whereas the big dinner and celebration is going to be on Christmas Day (25th) and Second Christmas Day (26th).
I hope you enjoyed this small peak in my little apartment and some dutch traditions. How do you spend the holidays? Do you decorate your house?
xo
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