Swedish Traditions | Anna's of North America

The Wish Cookie

Place a Ginger Thin in the palm of your hand. Then, make a wish. Using the index finger of your free hand, tap the cookie in the middle. Swedish tradition states that if the Ginger Thin breaks into three pieces, your wish will come true. If the Ginger Thin does not break into three pieces, you’ll just have to savour the cookie in smaller portions.

New Years News – First New Moon

This is the first New Moon of the New Year. If you are a maid and see it, make a curtsey three times to the moon, and it will tell you which man that you are to marry. It will be the first unmarried man you meet after the ceremony to the moon.

Midsummer Evening – Friday After Summer Solstice

The midsummer feast is the most popular festival in Sweden and is much older than Christianity. It originally celebrated summer’s fertility. The tradition is to erect a maypole (a pole covered with leaves and flowers) and dance around it as folk musicians play their accordions and fiddles. The dance goes on until the middle of the night.

Midsummer is a magical time, when the forces of nature are stronger than ever. If you pick seven different flowers from a meadow in total silence during the night (while the fairies are dancing on the meadows) and put them under your pillow, you will dream about your true love. The most preferable flowers to pick for this bouquet are cornflower, ox-eye daisy, forget-me-not, clover, German catchfly, birds-foot trefoil, harebell, buttercup, lady’s bedstraw and St. John’s wort.

Christmas Celebrations – Begins December 13

In Sweden, Christmas begins with St. Lucia Day on December 13. Lucia herself was Christian and died for her faith. The December 13 holiday honors her. Usually, the eldest girl in the family portrays St. Lucia. She puts on a white robe in the morning and is allowed to wear a crown full of candles. She serves her parents Lucia buns and coffee or mulled wine.

Christmas Eve: Swedish locals form processions to the church with lit candles on Christmas Eve (December 24), in some places. A little before that, Christmas trees were set up, which usually happens two days before Christmas. The trees and homes are decorated in seasonal spirit with gingerbread biscuits, Christmas decoration and flowers such as the Julstjärna (Poinsettia), red tulips, and red or white Amaryllis. Christmas Eve is known as Julafton in Swedish. Traditional Christmas Eve dinner usually includes smorgasbord or a buffet with ham, pork, or fish, as well as a variety of sweets.

A popular Christmas tradition in Sweden is to serve Risgryngrot, special rice porridge with one almond in it. The person who finds it gets to make a wish, or is believed to get married the coming year (this varies between families).

Name Day Calendar

Swedes like to celebrate. So with a Name Day Calendar you can celebrate not only your "birth" day but your "name" day as well! The Name Day Calendar was last updated in 2001 and won’t be updated until 2015.

Click on the link to see when your Name Day is!

http://skandland.com/calendar/netcal.htm