Happy Boxing Day!

Nicola here! I hope everyone has enjoyed a happy and peaceful Christmas Day. In the UK it's Boxing Day, an odd title that has nothing to do with the sport of boxing but lots to do with boxes. (I'm told that Boxing Day isn't celebrated in the US although it is in some other countries. I'm hoping people around the globe can let me know whether it is or not.) The first written mention of "boxing day" comes from Samuel Pepys diaries in 1663: "Thence by coach to my shoemaker's... and gave something to the boys' box against Christmas." The tradition was for patrons to give tradesmen and servants Christmas boxes, usually made of pottery and containing cash or gifts. I rather like the idea of a pottery box - it's a cut above cardboard, although there are some beautiful cardboard Christmas boxes around.  Five years later, Pepys mentioned boxes again, although he wasn't in quite such a jolly Christmas mood, recording in his diary: "Called up by drums and trumpets; these things and boxes having cost me much money this Christmas."

To my pleasure I did receive a gift "box" at Christmas; it contains shortbread biscuits and has a picture of a guide dog puppy on the front! What about you - did you receive any Christmas boxes this year? Whether you have been woken by drums or trumpets, or received a lovely china box for Christmas, we wish you a happy boxing day and here are some pictures from Charles Dickens' house to celebrate the festive season!

Comments

[Teresa Broderick]

Hope you had a good day Nicola. We call it St Stephen's Day here and back when we were children we would go from house to house playing instruments, singing, dancing etc. We would get a few coppers or food and drink. The groups doing the rounds would be called The Wren Boys as this was a song everyone would sing. I haven't seen this happen for years. It's sad really that all the old traditions are dying out.

[Anne Gracie]

We certainly have Boxing Day here in Australia, Nicola, though the giving of boxes doesn't really happen. Mostly it's the Boxing Day sales (shopping madness) and cricket, but for most of us it's relaxing after Christmas Day. The weather is usually warm to hot and a lot of people head for the beach.

[Vicki L.]

In the US, no Boxing day. But there is the mad crazy after Christmas sales. Which I abstain from thank you very much. The older I get, the less the wild sales are worth it.

[Janice]

Boxing Day to me here in LA means taking all the gifts I have received out of their boxes and putting them where they go. My wallet is fat with gift cards and my closet has a cozy robe and some nifty new sweaters hanging in it. It also means clearing no-longer-needed winter clothes out of my closet and taking them to a charity drop. Start the new year with good karma :)

[Mary T]

Back in the day, it was common to give small gifts (before Christmas) to folks who performed services for you - the mailman, the milkman (yes I'm that old), your beautician, etc. I think that has pretty much fallen be the wayside.

Before Christmas there are many organizations, both large and small, that collect donations for food and children's presents to be given to the poor. I've not seen anything special after Christmas that happens though.

[Joanna]

I'm also in UK but we do not do Boxing Day sales. We go for walk on Tynemouth beach. Very bracing.

[Nicola Cornick]

How interesting, Teresa! I knew it was St Stephen's Day but didn't realise there were musical connections. Love the old traditions!

[Nicola Cornick]

Anne, there's snow on the ground here and I'm luxuriating in thoughts of the sun and trips to the beach!

[Nicola Cornick]

Ah, no Boxing Day in the US! So interesting which traditions occur in different countries! We too have the mad sales although apparently this year it wasn't so mad because everyone did Black Friday instead. I guess that's a "new" tradition!"

[Nicola Cornick]

I love that thought, Janice. Let's all start the new year with good karma!

[Nicola Cornick]

Our neighbours still leave boxes of biscuits for the postman and the refuse collectors, which I think is a very nice recognition of the service they provide to the neighbourhood. I suppose that's the last remnants of those traditions.

[Nicola Cornick]

Oh yes, the bracing Boxing Day walk is a great traditions! We went up White Horse Hill and that was very refreshing too!

[Anne Gracie]

Meanwhile, my sister, who lives in Queensland and thinks it's cold if she has to put on a cardigan, is in Scotland, and gleefully posting photos of snow.
We love what we can't have

[Anne Gracie]

I'm joining you, Janice in the clearing out of closets and donating stuff to charity shops. A win-win situation -- now that's good karma.

[Claire Harter]

If you consider tins to be boxes, then I receive at least one nearly every year. My family knows I collect (smallish) tins and usually pack a gift in one or one in a gift. One of my nieces (Knowing I like Altoids) keeps an eye open for unusual Altoids tins, either by shape, size, or flavor . . . the ginger ones were the most interesting.

[Jana]

Boxing Day in Canada is like Black Friday in the US. Personally, I avoid it like the plague! But I do enjoy ha ing an extra day at home to spend with my family. In our house it's the day my son opens the toys he unwrapped on Christmas morning. It's quiet and peaceful and the closest I get to the stores is if I forgot that my family needed to set past Christmas Day and I need to go grocery shopping (like I did this year!). Surprisingly, the grocery store was absolutely dead but the stock people were busy refilling shelves. I like that we didn't need to hurry back to work the day after Christmas (except the poor retail clerks....I remember those days all too well) and could just enjoy each our own family unit without the rush of Christmas Day with all the glorious bustle of extended family.

[Luci]

Boxing Day. St Stephen’s Day. My daughter’s birthday. There’s plenty of presents, boxes, singing, food and drinks. She’s 16 this year. We had a lovely time with family and relations.

[Karen W.]

I'm in Canada too and we have Boxing Day. But poor hubby had to work at 6:00am at a huge discount retail store. I got to stay home. It's a statutory day off. At hubby's work you have to be hospitalized and show proof to justify not showing up for work!! I kissed him goodbye and rolled over and went back to sleep. Our Boxing Day tradition was Christmas Day was for immediate family and Boxing Day was for extended family. So we'd get and give presents on both days. This year was different and we did everything on Christmas Day.

[Nicola Cornick]

What a great thing to collect, Claire, and I love that your family pack gifts in them! That really is lovely. Your comment has reminded me that somewhere I have a book about antique tins. I must dig that book out.

[Nicola Cornick]

Hi Jana. Yes, I do feel for people who are working all through Christmas and don't have the chance to spend time with family and friends. Like you I avoid the sales at this time of year. All those crowds and frantic buying doesn't feel very peaceful to me but I realise buying a bargain is a high point for some! When I was a child it was thought very exciting to go to the Boxing Day sales but I don't think it was quite so busy in those days!

[Nicola Cornick]

Oh how lovely, Luci! I'm glad she had such a great birthday and how nice to extend the celebrations!

[Nicola Cornick]

Yikes, Karen, I hope he survived the sales and the early start and that you had a nice time when he got back from work! It's not holiday for everyone is it. Always interesting to see things from a different perspective!

[Wendy]

Hi Nicola

Here in the US we do not do Boxing Day but my mom sent me a box (little early) full of wonderful homemade black walnut chocolates. The box origanally contained shorbread biscuts and is a metal box that had pictures from London (bus, phone box, changing of the guard and big ben with the flag) I guess she sent it because I am her English child. (Born in Oxford many years ago) Love it now I just need to turn it into a cross stitch pattern. Hope you had a Happy Christmas and Have a wonderful new year

[Nicola Cornick]

Hi Wendy! I;d never heard of black walnut chocolates but they sound scrumptious! What a great idea to turn the picture on the tin into a cross stitch pattern too. A very Happy New year to you!

[Charlotte]

Hi !
Sorry to answer so late, I had saved the post to read it later... Which means now !
In France, we don't celebrate Boxing day as such. Still, the 26th of December is a bank holiday in Eastern France (Alsace-Moselle, where the old "Concordat" Napoleonic law still prevails for religious matters, because this area was occupied by Germany in 1905 when the "Separation of State and Church" law was adopted in France). It's a bank holiday because of the Saint Etienne, St Stephen's day.

But we do have a tradition more or less matching Christmas boxes : it's the étrennes. It's traditionnel, at the beginning of the New Year, to offer something to people providing services to you : the building caretaker if you're living in a flat, the postman, the house cleaner if you have one, the nanny/teacher of your kids, ...
It can be chocolates, a bottle of wine, small presents or, more usually, some money, depending of the job. For instance, as a Primary school teacher, I usually receive a few chocolate boxes as "étrennes" for the New Year (which I accept gratefully, whereas I'd definitely have to refuse money :) )