For me, it's the holiday traditions that make up for winter's chill, its darkness before the evening commute and months of being a football widow. Part of the magic of the holiday season is reminiscing over years gone by, family members we miss and traditions we hold dear. Old traditions remind us of our childhoods, while new traditions make each holiday season special. The bottom line is, as special as many traditions are, they change based on location, a change in family dynamics (like a new baby, or a loved one in the hospital). As someone who has lived in more than one place, I'm enjoying my new and evolved end-of-year traditions.
All Hallows Eve
Living in a high-rise apartment building in DC, I missed the Halloween tradition of handing out candy to kids. Instead, we dressed up and walked around Embassy Row, ringing the doorbell at the Russian, British and Korean embassies. The staff (and sometimes, even the ambassadors!) were usually more than happy to hand out candy to kids of all ages, and take pictures of all of us in our getups. Since moving to Bethlehem, we've developed new traditions. First, we have to figure out what night Trick or Treat is for our city. Sometimes it's on Halloween, but usually it's not. The first year I moved here, the kids started ringing our doorbell on October 29 and I wasn't prepared. Never again! In our neighborhood, parents sipping from Musikfest mugs pull kids in wagons along city sidewalks, a veritable mobile happy hour starring Dora the Explorer and Bumblebee the Transformer. Our dog, Stella, enjoys seeing and sniffing all the kids, but we especially like to see the little ones who are learning how to trick or treat. Mom or Dad encourages their daughter in a princess costume to approach a stranger and ask for candy, then take “only one piece,” and prompt, “What do you say?” before scooping them up to head off to the next house. Because so many kids visit our doorstep, we usually run out of candy before the official “trick or treat” hours are over. So, we put out the porch light and watch spooky movies.
Holiday Shopping Season
The holiday season in Bethlehem begins even before the last trick or treater has hauled his bag of Just Born Peeps back home. Seasonal decorations – specifically, evergreen trees on lampposts–start to go up in October. Bethlehem puts on its holiday best early in the season to attract visitors from November through the New Year, and those of us who live here get to enjoy it every day. Visitors on tour buses spill out on to the streets, marveling at the adorable shops, wonderful restaurants and beautiful architecture of our downtown. Holiday music playing outside, white twinkly lights everywhere on Main Street, and colorful lights on the South Side of Bethlehem: these are a few of my favorite things, and I'm so fortunate that I don't have to get on a bus to see them.
Once upon a time, my go-to holiday shopping destination was a small gift store in Easton called Sign of the Carpenter. The store featured handmade items, some by local artists that, to me, were unique and beautiful—unlike anything I could find where I lived in DC. When I'd visit the Lehigh Valley for Thanksgiving, I'd always take a trip to Centre Square, do the bulk of my holiday shopping there, and visit the Carmelcorn Shop before heading home. Many DC friends and mentors still have the decorations I gifted them years ago. Though Sign of the Carpenter is now closed, I still enjoy shopping in Downtown Easton and Bethlehem. I can find similar items at Cleo's in South Side Bethlehem, the Moravian Book Shop and ArtsyDiva on Main Street in Bethlehem, and at Christkindlmarkt. Speaking of evolving traditions, Christkindlmarkt will be moving to the South Side of Bethlehem this year, and will be opening November 17 near the ArtsQuest Center at SteelStacks. In addition to the usual tent full of juried crafts and art gifts, plus food, St. Nick and entertainment, the new location will offer more accessible parking and even more programming inside the ArtsQuest Center. After my annual visit, I'll swing by some of the other special gift shops I love on the South Side—Tallarico's Chocolates for chocolate-covered lemon cookies, Home & Planet for Christina Maser soy wax candles and special glass vases for “forcing” paper white bulbs, to name a few. Meanwhile, the North Side of Bethlehem will have its own little craft market on Main Street—twice the holiday cheer in Bethlehem? Sounds good to me.
Thanksgiving
Thanksgiving Eve is an unofficial holiday for the young people of the Lehigh Valley. Whether you grew up in the region and stayed, or moved away and still have family here, the night before Thanksgiving is the night to go out on the town. A few days before the holiday, Facebook status updates ding and text messages buzz as friends visiting from out of town begin to make plans to visit. Before the family fun begins, friends meet up and revel in the fact that nobody's working the next day, catch up on old times, and watch for who has let himself go since last Thanksgiving and who is paired up with whose ex these days. For transplants with no local family ties, Thanksgiving often involves a car trip, sleeping in your childhood bedroom (complete with posters and stuffed animals, if you're lucky), and spending time in your hometown. Maybe it's bigger than the Lehigh Valley, and you miss the action there. Or maybe it's smaller, and you can't turn around without stumbling over a classmate or someone you're related to. Either way, the Lehigh Valley is your “home” now—it's where you have made your life as an adult. Where your folks live is where you grew up, your hometown. So when you return from your weekend with the fam, you're heading home to the Lehigh Valley!
I've adopted my chosen family's Thanksgiving Day tradition. Thanksgiving morning, come snow or sunshine, the family gets together for a friendly game of touch football outdoors. Stella and I walk to the local elementary school field with a group of family and friends as cousins, aunts and uncles tangle on the gridiron. After the game, pastries and coffee are waiting at a nearby family member's home. Later in the day, we spend Thanksgiving together in whatever blended, sometimes random, group of family members can gather (often in shifts). My mom's traditional turkey is legendary, but the after-Thanksgiving turkey casserole, complete with a crunchy stuffing topping, is one of my all-time favorite dishes. When I was living in DC, she'd package up a few individual casseroles for me to take back with me. They didn't last long then, and they still don't!
“The informal rule for taking down holiday decorations is 12 days after Christmas. But I like to leave them up until Daylight Savings begins in March.”
Christmas
There are varying levels of taste, and commitment, to holiday decorating in the Lehigh Valley. Some people go all out, with blinking lights, inflatable snowmen and multiple displays. Others keep it simple with a few bushes netted with white lights and a wreath. Most houses and businesses in my neighborhood are at least decorated with a simple white candle in each window facing the street, and sometimes a Moravian Star. Our front porch light is a lit Moravian star, which is long and pointy. In-the-know transplants do not confuse the rotund Moravian Star with the Star of Bethlehem, which is long and pointy.
Nearly everyone has those little white candles in their windows, but most don't know the origin of the tradition. I did a little research, and discovered that the 26-point Moravian Star originated in the Moravian school handcraft sessions in Niesky, Germany around 1850, and is usually seen hanging and lighted at night. The Moravian Church in North America calls this tradition Illumination. It refers to the German custom of putting a lighted candle in each window after dark, and is also common in the Moravian settlements of Salem and Lititz, too.
Our candles are battery-operated, and each has a light sensor, so we don't need to remember to turn them on every night and off in the morning. Once we seal them inside the double-pane window well on Black Friday, we kind of forget about them until after the New Year. The informal rule for taking down holiday decorations is 12 days after Christmas. But I like to leave them up until Daylight Savings begins in March. There is ongoing discussion in our household as to whether these candles are a holiday decoration at all, or a “Bethlehem thing.”
In our family, traditions are sacred, but they're constantly evolving. The annual trek to cut down a tree at a farm in the Endless Mountains evolved to the annual assembly of a pre-lit tower of greenery. Decorating this new tree may involve a ladder now, but we still play the same Christmas music as we did when I was little: Andy Williams, Johnny Mathis and John Denver.
It's become a tradition to treat my parents to a night at the theater during the month of December in lieu of a wrapped gift. We've seen “A Christmas Carol” at the Civic Theater a few times; the community production of Charles Dickens' classic is always endearing. The cast is so large, it seems that half the children of Allentown play a part (and that their family members are on either side of us in the audience). Last year, we visited the Sherman Theater in Stroudsburg for a holiday production of “Bowfire,” a fiddle/violin group that entertained a large crowd in the historic theater. We haven't decided yet which show we'll see, so we'll be watching The Morning Call's Go Guide and Express Times' Exposed for recommendations.
Another new tradition is to participate in the annual Luminaria Night. New Bethany Ministries sponsors the event in many neighborhoods in and around Bethlehem. Luminaria Night, a special new tradition for us, simply glows: the homes in our neighborhood line the streets with white bags with votive candles burning inside. The proceeds from the sale of the luminaries go to New Bethany Ministries on the South Side of Bethlehem. We serve as captains for our block, taking orders for sand, candles and paper bags, collecting donations for New Bethany. We exchange the checks and order form for a ton of supplies, which we distribute in time for everyone to assemble their luminaries for the designated night. On Luminaria Night, the neighborhoods glow with candlelight, an outward demonstration of our neighbors' generosity and kind spirit. The event raised about $40,000 last year for critical human services for those who need it most in our community.
Regardless of whether the Lehigh Valley has always been your home, it's where we live now, and if you haven't started forming holiday traditions…just make one up! Let this be the first year you do something— annually. Cheers!
by megan beste | illustration by marcie kent
