Spanish Traditions at Christmastime

These are Christmas traditions that our students do to celebrate with their families and friends. The german students have written in red colour TOO  for all traditions that we have in Germany, too. 

• On the 24th of December I have a dinner with my family. TOO
• The streets are decorated with lights and in the squares there are attractions and a big Christmas tree.TOO
• On Christmas Day, Santa Claus gives presents.
• On Christmas Eve, we meet with our families.
• On the 5th of January, you can watch the Parade of the Three Wise Men.
• We go to the Christmas Parade.
• We have a tradition where we eat twelve grapes on New Year's Eve in the twelve seconds before the new year.
• We put up models of the nativity scene.TOO
• On New Year's Day we put on fireworks.(on New Years eve)
• We put up the Christmas tree.TOO
• We have typical Christmas dishes, such as special croquettes, roast lamb, suckling pig, shrimp, turrones (special chocolates with nuts), and Roscon de Reyes (a special Christmas cake). TOO
• We write letters to the Three Wise Men or Santa Claus asking for presents.
• On the 6th of January, the Three Wise Men give presents.
• We have a game where we put in a bag all of our names and we draw a slip of paper. We then leave a present for the friend whose name we picked.TOO
• We decorate our houses with the Christmas tree, lights, stockings, wreaths, and figurines of Santa, animals, etc.TOO
• We have an advent calendar where we can eat a piece of chocolate every day leading up to Christmas.TOO
• We build a snowman if we have snow on the ground (but unfortunately in Spain we don't have that much snow...).TOO
• We have special drinks and hot chocolate (which we drink with the Roscon de Reyes).
• We sing Christmas carols with tambourines.
• We visit our neighbors and sing Christmas carols. People give us money when we visit them.
• We play a lot of different games, such as bingo and card games.TOO
• We have a great, great time with our families!TOO