Download or read book Christmas written by Bruce David Forbes and published by Univ of California Press. This book was released on 2007-10-10 with total page 198 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Written for everyone who loves and is simultaneously driven crazy by the holiday season, Christmas: A Candid History provides an enlightening, entertaining perspective on how the annual Yuletide celebration got to be what it is today. In a fascinating, concise tour through history, the book tells the story of Christmas—from its pre-Christian roots, through the birth of Jesus, to the holiday's spread across Europe into the Americas and beyond, and to its mind-boggling transformation through modern consumerism. Packed with intriguing stories, based on research into myriad sources, full of insights, the book explores the historical origins of traditions including Santa, the reindeer, gift giving, the Christmas tree, Christmas songs and movies, and more. The book also offers some provocative ideas for reclaiming the joy and meaning of this beloved, yet often frustrating, season amid the pressures of our fast-paced consumer culture. DID YOU KNOW For three centuries Christians did not celebrate Christmas? Puritans in England and New England made Christmas observances illegal? St. Nicholas is an elf in the famous poem "The Night Before Christmas"? President Franklin Roosevelt changed the dateof Thanksgiving in order to lengthen the Christmas shopping season? Coca-Cola helped fashion Santa Claus's look in an advertising campaign?
Download or read book The Book of Christmas Folklore written by Tristram Potter Coffin and published by . This book was released on 1973 with total page 220 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Insights into the culture of pre-Christian Europe are provided as the author seeks out the origins and meanings of songs, food, legends, and other items associated with yuletide.
Download or read book The Story of Christmas written by Patricia A. Pingry and published by Worthy Kids/Ideals. This book was released on 2022-10-04 with total page 22 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Discover the story of the first Christmas in this newly illustrated classic, perfect for little ones curious about the story behind their holiday celebrations. Expertly crafted for the attention span of toddlers, this simple book tells the biblical story of Christmas--from the Annunciation to the birth of Jesus and the arrival of the wise men. The story also helps little listeners understand the connection between the first Christmas and today's celebrations and traditions. With bright illustrations and a toddler-friendly length of about 200 words, this book is an age-appropriate way to introduce the story of the Nativity. A perfect addition for Christmas stockings!
Download or read book The Christmas Story written by Jane Werner Watson and published by Golden Books. This book was released on 2013-11-27 with total page 35 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Share the true meaning of Christmas with your children this holiday season. This simple but poetic text brings to life the story of Jesus' birth in a stable in Bethlehem. First published in 1952, this Little Golden Book adaption of the Christmas story was illustrated by beloved artist Eloise Wilkin. This classic picture book retelling of the Christmas story is a perfect gift for the holidays.
Download or read book Encyclopaedia Britannica written by Hugh Chisholm and published by . This book was released on 1910 with total page 1090 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This eleventh edition was developed during the encyclopaedia's transition from a British to an American publication. Some of its articles were written by the best-known scholars of the time and it is considered to be a landmark encyclopaedia for scholarship and literary style.
Download or read book A Very Noisy Christmas written by Tim Thornborough and published by The Good Book Company. This book was released on 2021-12-15 with total page 24 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A fun re-telling of the Christmas story for young children, including regular invitations to make some noise! Some people think that Christmas was a "Silent Night". Far from it. It was filled with shouting, singing and screaming! It was as noisy as any of our Christmas celebrations. This fun and fresh retelling of the Christmas story comes with invitations to make some noise, so that children can join in as parents read to them. But it also shows children that at the heart of the Christmas story is something we should all be quiet and see: God's Son Jesus was born, so that we can be friends with God forever. A wonderful Christmas gift for children aged 2-4.
Download or read book The Spirit of Christmas written by Nancy Tillman and published by Feiwel & Friends. This book was released on 2009-09-29 with total page 38 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A celebration of the most magical holiday of the year, by the incomparable bestselling author Nancy Tillman. Bells jingle, sleds dash through the snow, trees are topped with sparkling stars, and children everywhere dream of candy canes and presents. But the best gift of all-the most magical gift of the season-is when we spend Christmas with those we love. Once again, this New York Times-bestselling author and artist has created a special, beautiful book that families will want to share year after year. (And readers will want to look for The Spirit of Christmas image that Nancy Tillman has hidden on every page!)
Download or read book Always Together at Christmas written by Sara Sargent and published by Random House Books for Young Readers. This book was released on 2020-11-03 with total page 34 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Help children discover the joy of Christmas 2020 with this timely picture book that affirms the special magic of the holidays even if we're physically separated from our loved ones! Christmas will always mean love. Even if love looks a little different this year. As families and communities come together--and stay apart--in creative ways this holiday season, bring comfort and joy to children with this story about a Christmas like no other. Always Together at Christmas highlights different family traditions and the ways they're changing in 2020: from Santa's elves practicing social distancing to opening presents via Zoom on Christmas morning. And it even includes ideas for new quarantine-appropriate Christmas traditions! The sweet and cozy illustrations add classic touches, making this book the perfect gift to share with family and friends from across the miles.
Download or read book Christmas in America written by Penne L. Restad and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 1996-12-05 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The manger or Macy's? Americans might well wonder which is the real shrine of Christmas, as they take part each year in a mix of churchgoing, shopping, and family togetherness. But the history of Christmas cannot be summed up so easily as the commercialization of a sacred day. As Penne Restad reveals in this marvelous new book, it has always been an ambiguous meld of sacred thoughts and worldly actions-- as well as a fascinating reflection of our changing society. In Christmas in America, Restad brilliantly captures the rise and transformation of our most universal national holiday. In colonial times, it was celebrated either as an utterly solemn or a wildly social event--if it was celebrated at all. Virginians hunted, danced, and feasted. City dwellers flooded the streets in raucous demonstrations. Puritan New Englanders denounced the whole affair. Restad shows that as times changed, Christmas changed--and grew in popularity. In the early 1800s, New York served as an epicenter of the newly emerging holiday, drawing on its roots as a Dutch colony (St. Nicholas was particularly popular in the Netherlands, even after the Reformation), and aided by such men as Washington Irving. In 1822, another New Yorker named Clement Clarke Moore penned a poem now known as "'Twas the Night Before Christmas," virtually inventing the modern Santa Claus. Well-to-do townspeople displayed a German novelty, the decorated fir tree, in their parlors; an enterprising printer discovered the money to be made from Christmas cards; and a hodgepodge of year-end celebrations began to coalesce around December 25 and the figure of Santa. The homecoming significance of the holiday increased with the Civil War, and by the end of the nineteenth century a full- fledged national holiday had materialized, forged out of borrowed and invented custom alike, and driven by a passion for gift-giving. In the twentieth century, Christmas seeped into every niche of our conscious and unconscious lives to become a festival of epic proportions. Indeed, Restad carries the story through to our own time, unwrapping the messages hidden inside countless movies, books, and television shows, revealing the inescapable presence--and ambiguous meaning--of Christmas in contemporary culture. Filled with colorful detail and shining insight, Christmas in America reveals not only much about the emergence of the holiday, but also what our celebrations tell us about ourselves. From drunken revelry along colonial curbstones to family rituals around the tree, from Thomas Nast drawing the semiofficial portrait of St. Nick to the making of the film Home Alone, Restad's sparkling account offers much to amuse and ponder.
Download or read book A Christmas Story written by Jean Shepherd and published by Crown. This book was released on 2010-10-27 with total page 109 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A beloved, bestselling classic of humorous and nostalgic Americana—the book that inspired the equally classic Yuletide film and the live musical on Fox. The holiday film A Christmas Story, first released in 1983, has become a bona fide Christmas perennial, gaining in stature and fame with each succeeding year. Its affectionate, wacky, and wryly realistic portrayal of an American family’s typical Christmas joys and travails in small-town Depression-era Indiana has entered our imagination and our hearts with a force equal to It’s a Wonderful Life and Miracle on 34th Street. This edition of A Christmas Story gathers together in one hilarious volume the gems of autobiographical humor that Jean Shepherd drew upon to create this enduring film. Here is young Ralphie Parker’s shocking discovery that his decoder ring is really a device to promote Ovaltine; his mother and father’s pitched battle over the fate of a lascivious leg lamp; the unleashed and unnerving savagery of Ralphie’s duel in the show with the odious bullies Scut Farkas and Grover Dill; and, most crucially, Ralphie’s unstoppable campaign to get Santa—or anyone else—to give him a Red Ryder carbine action 200-shot range model air rifle. Who cares that the whole adult world is telling him, “You’ll shoot your eye out, kid”? The pieces that comprise A Christmas Story, previously published in the larger collections In God We Trust, All Others Pay Cash and Wanda Hickey’s Night of Golden Memories, coalesce in a magical fashion to become an irresistible piece of Americana, quite the equal of the film in its ability to warm the heart and tickle the funny bone.
Download or read book The History of Christmas written by Heather Lefebvre and published by CF4Kids. This book was released on 2019 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: History of Christmas from Bethlehem to today Bible readings, questions, recipes and activities Beautiful colour illustrations
Download or read book The World Encyclopedia of Christmas written by Gerry Bowler and published by McClelland & Stewart. This book was released on 2012-10-23 with total page 1075 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: At last, a truly comprehensive look at Christmas and all of its customs with its long history around the world. The World Encyclopedia of Christmas contains articles on the history of Christmas baking, drinking, and merrymaking, and Christmas dramas, music, literature, art, and films. It includes entries on the evolution of the Christmas tree and the Christmas card, gift-giving, and decoration of church and home. There are profiles of the many gift-bringers, from Santa Claus to Babouschka, and miraculous tales of the numerous saints associated with the season. And there are histories of seasonal celebrations and folk customs around the world, from the United States to Japan, from Egypt to Iceland. Who, for example, knew the links between the Punch and Judy show and Christmas? That the medieval Paradise tree hung with tempting apples was the forerunner of the Christmas tree? About the Peerie Guizers, who terrorized the Shetland Islands, going door-to-door for Christmas charity? Or what Freudians make of our interest in Christmas stockings and Santa’s entrance through the chimney? There are detailed accounts of Wren Boys and Star Boys, mumming and wassailing, the Feast of Fools and the origins of eggnog. And of course stories of the Nativity and legends of the Magi. With beautifully illustrated accounts ranging from the pagan roots of Yuletide, through the birth of Christ, and the long and fascinating history of the festival ever since, The World Encyclopedia of Christmas, is a rich and continually surprising array of religious and secular history, trivia, literature, and art. This wonderful book deserves to find a home with every family that celebrates Christmas.
Download or read book How Winston Delivered Christmas written by Alex T. Smith and published by Pan Macmillan. This book was released on 2021-10-28 with total page 224 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Join a brave little mouse on a big Christmas adventure! This is the chapter book edition of Alex T. Smith's modern Christmas classic How Winston Delivered Christmas, with gorgeous black and white illustrations from the author throughout – the perfect festive gift for newly confident readers. Winston is on a Very Important Mission. On Christmas Eve, he finds a letter to Father Christmas that did not make it to the post box – so, with no time to lose, he sets out to deliver it himself in time for Christmas Day! He has a lot of Very Exciting Adventures on his Very Important Mission and makes some wonderful friends along the way. Will he find Father Christmas in time? How Winston Delivered Christmas is a heartwarming illustrated story by Alex T. Smith, bestselling author of the Claude series.
Download or read book A Christmas Spider s Miracle written by Trinka Hakes Noble and published by Sleeping Bear Press. This book was released on 2011-09-01 with total page 34 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Long ago in a faraway place there lived two mothers. One, a humble peasant woman who struggled daily to provide for her children. And the other, a mother spider who also worked hard to care for her family. And although it would appear they were as different as night and day, these two mothers had more in common than would first seem. As the only holiday gift she can give her children, one cold Christmas Eve the peasant woman goes to the forest to get a tree, never noticing that someone has made a home among its branches. During the night, the mother spider spins webs decorating the tree, resulting in a Christmas that neither mother will ever forget. Based on an old Ukrainian story, Trinka Hakes Noble (The Orange Shoes) crafts an original heartwarming tale of the grace that can be found in the true spirit of Christmas. Trinka Hakes Noble's numerous picture books include The Scarlet Stockings Spy (IRA Teachers' Choice 2005), The Last Brother, The Orange Shoes (IRA Teachers' Choice 2008), and Apple Tree Christmas. Ms. Noble lives in northern New Jersey. Stephen Costanza attended the Philadelphia College of Art. His picture books are Mozart Finds a Melody, Noodle Man: The Pasta Superhero, and Ten Big Toes and a Prince's Nose. He lives in Belfast, Maine.
Download or read book Logistics written by Chris Coppel and published by Troubador Publishing Ltd. This book was released on 2022-01-28 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: After being abandoned at the age of two and a half, Holly Hillman was raised without whimsy or fantasy. She was taught that there were no such things as Santa Claus, fairies, elves or any other accepted fantasies that help a child deal with the harder realities of life. Now in her forties, she is the CEO of a Fortune 400 company. She rose to the top through hard work, but also by living without distractions or social attachments. Despite her rigidly ingrained dedication, Holly was content with her life, having never lived by any other tenet. Everything was perfect until she was required to give her DNA as part of a health check leading up her company’s merger with an Asian conglomerate. The results of her test unlocked the secret of her unique ancestry, leading to her having to confront a fantastical truth that would forever change her views on life and reality itself.
Download or read book Dear Santa written by Rod Campbell and published by Macmillan Children's Books. This book was released on 2013 with total page 20 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A letter to Santa starts off a merry chain of gift-wrapping, but nothing is quite right and each time Santa thinks better of his choice. Lift the flaps to unwrap each present and find out what Santa chooses as the perfect present in the end!
Download or read book A Bag for Santa written by Kendra Esbrook and published by . This book was released on 1996 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
