Dorset Wedding Photographers Courtenay Photographic Ltd
The Wedding Photographers in Dorset Blog
On Christmas morning since medieval times, church bells have been rung to announce to the world the coming of the saviour. It was customary from the 18th century to wear clothes and carry a small bell to signify the birth of Christ. The ringing of the bells was to signify the importance of the His Birth.
Hope you have enjoyed our Christmas trivia facts this year, have a Merry Christmas 
Hanging the Christmas stocking on the hearth on Christmas Eve in the hope that it will be filled with presents the next morning is a custom that goes back about 400 years. It derived from the custom in Holland of children placing wooden shoes next to the hearth the night before the arrival of St. Nicholas. The children would fill their shoes with straw and food for St Nicholas’s for the donkey that carried the gifts. In exchange he would leave them a small gift such as small cakes, fruits and other gifts. Stockings were substituted for the shoes in Britain, most of Europe and in North America.
The actual gift givers are different in various countries:
Spain and South America: The Three Kings
Italy: La Befana (a kindly old witch)
England: Father Christmas
France: Pere Noel (Father Christmas)
Russia: In some parts – Babouschka (a grandmotherly figure)
Other parts it is Grandfather Frost.
Germany: Christkind (angelic messenger from Jesus)
She is a beautiful fair haired girl with a shining crown of candles.
Scandinavia: a variety of Christmas gnomes. One is called Julenisse
Holland: St Nicholas.
In 1937, the first postage stamp to commemorate Christmas was issued in Austria.
The Celts used to bring a large log indoors as a tribute to the sun god. In Cornwall, revellers would chalk a symbol of a man on the log in a cheery reference to the human sacrifices who used to be thrown on the bonfire.
Quite glad the sacrifice tradition has run its course!
The largest functional Christmas cracker was 45.72 metres long and 3.04 metres in diameter. It was made by Australian international rugby player Ray Price in Markson Sparks of New South Wales, Australia and was pulled in the car park of the Westfield Shopping Town in Chatswood, Sydney, Australia on 9 November 1991.
Wonder what the toy was… a car perhaps? 
In Christmas tree decorations, angels are usually portrayed as wimpy blondes in girl’s blouses and sandals. In the Bible, however, angels are muscular bullies who frequently goad humans into fistfights. Life isn’t all harps and heavenly choirs for angels; there’s a strict career structure. The only angels mentioned by name in the Bible are archangels, the eighth-ranking order of angels.
