My Late Adoption of a Supposed German Tradition
I started thinking about this prompt at about the same time
as we started putting up our Christmas tree. When our kids were younger, I bought
a blown glass pickle ornament for our tree, intrigued by the supposed
connection to German traditions. I always made some special Norwegian Christmas
cookies every year, but until then I didn’t do anything Christmassy to celebrate
my Grandma Nora’s German ancestry. Hence, the pickle.
According to Wikipedia, the pickle ornaments may not really
be a German tradition. The article on the Christmas pickle states:
“There are a number of different origin stories
attributed to the tradition, including one originating in Germany. This theory
has since been discounted, and it is now thought to be a German-American
tradition created in the late 19th century. In fact, the New York Times
reported that out of 2,057 Germans polled, YouGov determined 91% were unaware
of the legend.”
Whether or not the pickle is truly a German tradition or
not, in our family it is meant to remind us of our German heritage. The pickle
ornament, or Weihnachtsgurke in German, is supposed to be hidden in the tree,
and the child who finds it first will get a special present or will have a wish
for the New Year granted. Now that our children are adults, we haven’t been
hiding the pickle anymore—we just enjoy hanging it up and chuckling about it.
This year we actually have three pickles on the tree! I thought
we’d lost the original one—a cute, tiny gherkin. So I bought a replacement
three years ago at Ace Hardware in Mission Viejo, California. It was a larger
pickle, about 3 inches long. This year, we found the original buried in a box
of ornaments, so I hung both on the tree.
 |
| My third pickle ornament... |
I belong to a Garden Club and our club Christmas party
included a gift exchange with a gardening theme. I received a nice pair of gardening
gloves with a third pickle ornament tucked inside a glove! So now I have three
reminders of my German heritage on our tree!
Froliche Weihnacten! Und Frohes Neues Jahr! May you all find
a lucky pickle in your tree!
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