Tuesday evening was the annual Christmas dinner held at our local Danish Sisterhood meeting. Each year members that grew up in Denmark or guests who are visiting from Denmark prepare traditional holiday foods and share traditions like songs, stories and crafts.

In Denmark, intricate paper cutting and paper weaving are a few of the traditional crafts practiced by accomplished artisans as well as by school children. These little woven heart baskets are adorable filled with greenery or candies and hung on the Christmas tree.

Another tradition is the burning of the "calendar" candle. The candle is a long taper which has 24 marks that represent the days in December leading up to Christmas. Each day, the candle is burned for about one hour in anticipation of Christmas Day. Christmas calendars are also very traditional and are now even found online.