It’s one of the most popular Christmas carols but also one of the most confounding. Why exactly would anyone want to give their true love “eight maids a-milking?” But that’s just what the writer of “The Twelve Days of Christmas” Read more…
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“Marley was dead: to begin with. There is no doubt whatever about that.” It’s a rather dark way for a Christmas story to begin, yet that’s exactly how author Charles Dickens opens “A Christmas Carol.” And he’s quite clear on Read more…
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I never really bought into the “Santa Claus is Comin’ to Town” storyline as far as how Santa came to be Santa. Though Mickey Rooney did a good job as Kris Kringle, the whole idea of there being a Burgermeister Read more…
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I only had to travel to the heart of Burnet to be whisked back in time and thousands of miles away to a tiny hamlet near Jerusalem on a chilly winter’s night. While the shepherds and wise men followed a Read more…
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Eggnog. Say it with me: “Eggnog.” It sounds so festive — a holiday drink donning a tacky Christmas sweater and getting crazy at the office party. I remember trying my first swig as a kid. It only hit the grocery story Read more…
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When I married my wife, Sheri, she had a poinsettia that her mom had given to her a few years before our first Christmas together. Now, I was quite amazed by this because most poinsettias make it through December and Read more…
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The other day, my youngest son, Zach, asked me, “What’s Boxing Day?” I looked at him and replied, “What?” The question came out of nowhere as we were sitting in our living room watching the latest episode of whatever was Read more…
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With all the varieties of Christmas trees available today along with millions of different ornaments, it’s hard to believe that early Americans looked with disdain on the holiday centerpiece. William Bradford, the second governor of the early Plymouth Colony, was Read more…
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MARBLE FALLS — The fruit cake. Yes, it’s much maligned, but does it deserve such a reputation? And from where did this Christmas staple come? The fruit cake can possibly date its lineage back to the Roman Empire, or at Read more…
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With the church’s organ down and repairs not likely until after Christmas, the Church of St. Nicholaus faced an 1818 Christmas Eve service with neither music nor carols. Set in the Austrian Alps outside of Salzburg, the town of Oberndorf Read more…
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