On Christmas Eve, we were finally allowed to put the figurine of the Baby Jesus in the manager in the nativity scene underneath the Christmas Tree. He was the only figure who was not in the nativity scene until Christmas Eve. We three children always squabbled over which of us got to place the Baby Jesus in the nativity scene, but my mother either decided which of us would do it on a rotating basis or else she would do it herself (usually the latter).
Since Christmas Eve was technically still Advent and we were still abstaining from meat, our Christmas Evening meal was a bowl of oyster stew. I think it was an Irish tradition, but I’m not certain of that. Whatever tradition it was, I hated it. I despised oyster stew. I dislike oysters in general, but I really hated oyster stew. For my dinner, I would slurp some of the milky soup and eat many oyster crackers. For me, Christmas Eve dinner was the worst dinner of the year.
Our neighbors on the north side of us, Levina and Herman Heilmann, would always stop over on their way to Christmas Eve services at the Lutheran Church. Herman was from Germany and Levina learned to make all sorts of German Christmas cookies from his family. His brother Gus lived in town and his wife was German, so Levina learned much of her fabulous baking skills from his wife Alfrieda. (After Alfrieda and Herman had both passed away, Levina and Gus married and were together in the remaining years of their lives.) The Heilmanns would bring us a huge box of Christmas cookies and Christmas gifts for each of us. I especially looked forward to the Christmas cookies since I sort of made my Christmas Eve meal from them (after the horrendous oyster stew).
Later in the evening my grandparents and Uncle Don would come to the house to open presents with us. My grandparents and Uncle Don always came to our home on Christmas Eve to open gifts and celebrate Christmas Eve, and then they would go to Midnight Mass at Our Lady of Lourdes Church. On Christmas morning, they would go to my Aunt Elsie and Uncle Bob’s house to open gifts with my cousins. On Christmas Eve while my grandparents and Uncle Don were visiting, we would drink eggnog and eat Mrs. Heilmann’s Christmas cookies. My favorite cookies were the honey and spice Lebchuchen which were cut into a variety of shapes and lightly coated with a thin, hard sugar coating. There was two other kinds of cookie that my father and I were particularly fond of: a sort of fruit cake bars, which was a dark, cake-like cookie filled with candies fruits and nuts; and pferrinesse, or pepper cookies, small rounded mounds which tasted of anisette and were covered with white powdered sugar. Mrs. Heilmann, or as we called her “Aunt Levina,” also included star-shaped sugary cookies covered with white icing and colorful sprinkles and a spriegel cookies, which were cookies piped from a bag filled with dough into the shape of candy canes. Two types of dough were piped: one red, and one white. Then Levina twisted them together to form the candy cane. They were colorful and tasted a bit like shortbread.
I loved having Grandma and Grandpa at the house. They always seemed to enjoy seeing us open their gifts and they “oohhed” and aahhed” over the gifts we gave them. Uncle Donald enjoyed himself wherever he went and often helped assemble any toys that needed to be put together. The Christmas lights on the windows were lit as were the lights on the tree, making it a very festive occasion.
Several years, my grandmother made Della Robias, which were wreaths made of pinecones and small, plastic fruits such as pears, apples, and berries that were glued onto a circular wooden wreath shape that my father had cut out of wood for her. She taught my mother how to make them, too. They originated in Italy and originally surrounded painting by the Italian artist della Robia, from which they took there name. Our Della Robias usually held a tall red candle in the center of the wreath and made a festive decoration.
I remember that one of my favorite gifts that I received from my grandparents when I was about 4 years old was a doll house with doll furniture and little people. I adored playing with this gift and it was very difficult to pry me away from the doll house to go to bed to await Santa’s arrival.
On Christmas Eve, there were many special programs on television, which at that time was only in black and white. (Color television had not yet been invented.) I best remember the Perry Como specials, where he always sang “Ave Maria,” which is the Hail. Mary prayer in Latin. Oftentimes he also sang the Our Father. That was sung in English. There were also Christmas songs that were popular at the time on his special and there were always children gathered around him as he sang.
When we were very young, we went to church on Christmas morning, usually to the 9 a.m. Mass, since we were always up early to open our gifts from Santa. I know my parents had stayed up late into the night wrapping gits from Santa and then placing them in our designated piles under the tree. Our Christmas stockings were laid on top of the piles. After we had opened our gifts and eaten some breakfast (usually pancakes), we went to church. Church on Christmas was always very crowded, as many people who never went to church often always seemed to go to church on Christmas and Easter. My father was always ready to go early and got us into our winter outerwear and we always go to church early enough to get seats in the pews. However, the ushers squeezed as many people as possible into the pews so we were always cramped. The rest of the people had to stand in the back of the church.
The same was true when we started to go to Midnight Mass at St. John the Evangelist Church, our home church, when we were older. It was usually a candle-light ceremony and a High Mass, which meant that the choir sang the responses to the priest as he said the Mass. Before Mass began, the choir sang Christmas carols and they also sang them at appropriate times during the Mass. Often all three priests at our church celebrated Midnight Mass together, called con-celebration. Since nearly everyone received communion, it took a while for the Mass to be celebrated. It began about 11:30 p.m. with Christmas carols and we arrived back home about 1:30 a.m.
We were all very tired by that time, and we children went straight to bed, but my poor parents still had to fix our Christmas presents for the next morning. Christmas Eve was a long night.
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