23 December, 2014

Christmas - Childhood memories

I have many childhood memories associated with Christmas. Did you study in any Christian missionary school? I did. Whoever has studied in a missionary school can relate well to this post. Christmas reminds me of the following:

1. Christmas Carols:

The word Carol means 'dance to something'. Our music teacher used to teach these songs from November itself. We have a tradition to sing a song after our daily morning prayer in the school. We used to sing these carols during morning prayer and even in the church behind our school.

2. Christmas tree and star:

As per the tradition, Christians bring decorated Spruce/pine/fir tree to home to celebrate Christmas. They decorate it with edibles like apples, nuts or candy canes and with specific ornaments like balls and illuminate it with candles. 
As per the history, Christmas star is placed outside households to commemorate star of Bethlehem which revealed the birth of Jesus.

On the way from our home to school, we used to count number of stars decorated outside the houses and used to discuss which one is good. There used to be a Christmas tree decorated in school too. We have an arts and crafts class which targets on preparing crafts from waste. Our arts and crafts teacher used to teach on preparing simple crafts to decorate Christmas tree.


3. Santa Claus:

Saint Nicholas, a 4th century Bishop has a habit to gift to children. In US, People called him Santa clause. So, this tradition of gifting started from there.

Now, comes the favourite part of Christmas :) Our head mistress or any other senior teacher used to come as Santa Clause before Christmas with 'jingle bells' playing in the background and used to distribute chocolates in the morning prayer. 



4. Chrisma Chrischild game: 

It's also known as Secret Santa. It shows children the importance of kindness or giving. Teacher used to distribute one chit to each student on which some other student's name would be written. We will become Secret Santa / Chrismom for the student on our chit and he/she will become our Chris child. There used to be a Christmas tree or gift stand kept outside the corridor of the school, where Secret Santa should can place their gift to Chris child without revealing their identity. It's a fun experience to play this game altogether :) Sometimes, our Secret Santa can also assign some simple tasks to chris child in return to the gift like singing a multi lingual song in each class, reading weather reports, coming to school dressed in ethnic wear etc., So, December month used to be funny throughout :)

I had fun time with this game both in school days and also after I joined office. 


So, these were few things that i remember from my childhood days about Christmas. 

There is a blog hop #ChristmasBonanza happening in this month with around 20+ blogger publishing a blog post per day throughout the month. So, enjoy the posts :)



Until next time,







Image courtesy: www.freeimages.com



Come join a set of fabulous bloggers sharing their Christmas moments - Easy Holiday Crafts, DIY ideas, Recipes , Decor ideas and book recommendations with you .

http://www.artsycraftsymom.com/?p=4396




Starting from today till Christmas and beyond, each one of us will be writing a post related to Christmas.

Participating blogs

ArtsyCraftsyMom - munniofalltrades - hfareensspace - roohiscollections - hellomommyhood - attachedmoms - totschooltotallyawesome - Themomviews - bumpsnbaby.com -

rugsoflife - oneandahalfminutes - shishuworld - ruskandtea - aspoonfullofideas - orangekitchens - obsessivemom - rachnaparmar - parentingmantras -

onboardthemommyship - kwikdekoblog - thekeybunch - momzspace - whatscookingmom - coloursdekor - happypeopleevents





So sit back, relax and check out all the fabulous Christmas Bonanza posts from our participating blogs in the linky. Support us by sharing our posts using the hash tag #ChristmasBonanza





This Linky is for participating blogs only, but We would love to see your Christmas Crafts too. Come and link up your Christmas post at ArtsyCraftsyMom.com








22 December, 2014

Best books I read in 2014

New year is coming! Count down started :-)
It's time to remember good and bad things happened. Enjoy and reminisce good memories and learn from mistakes. Right? 

Since mine is a book blog, I want to list my best reads of 2014.
Even though I didn't get time to review many books in my blog, I have got chance to read a variety of books this year.  Read the famous Shiva Trilogy books by Amish Tripathy this year, which was pending from long time in my wish list. FYI, Shiva trilogy has 3 books in the series - The immortals of Meluha, The secret of Nagas and The oath of Vayuputras.
Got a chance to complete 2 books in Taj trilogy written by Indu Sundaresan - The Twentieth Wife and The feast of Roses. Both have been a fantastic read. I have also read some light hearted practical stories this year like Lucifier's Lungi, Ri, The Little hearts etc.,

So, here goes the best books that I have read this year:

1. The Twentieth Wife
This book is first in the series of Taj Trilogy. If you want to know more about each and every detail of Mughal empire, traditions in their time and importance of women, this is for you. I enjoyed reading this as I love history. Here is my review


2. The Secret of Nagas
This is the second book in Shiva trilogy series. All three books are fine, but this book in trilogy is better. I liked the way Amish Tripathy created the characters of this mythological fantasy novel. It's interesting to know and relate things related to our ancient India like Saraswati river, preparation of amrutham which gives immortality etc., Even though there are many myths in this fantasy novel, I liked the research behind the story and gained some knowledge on ancient India. 


3. Lucifier's Lungi
Whle the books above are on serious note, this book is a light hearted read. A very short book which I enjoyed it every bit. This book talks about the protagonist of novel being modern and not believing in any myths and legends, travelling to a small village. His mind set completely changes after his funny experience in the village. Here is my review


4. Ramayana - The Game of life : Rise of Sun Prince
This first book of Ramayana in the series of books by Shubha Vilas covers Ramayana from the birth of Lord Rama till his marriage. Book has extra information on importance of each incidence in Ramayana and characters are explained in very detail. Overall, it's enjoyable and knowledgeable read. Here is my review


5. God is a gamer
This is one of my favourite genre. It's a thriller and I learnt many new things about gaming industry and term 'bit coin'. Thoroughly enjoyed reading this and cannot put the book aside until I finished it. Here is my review


I wish, I read more interesting and variety of books in the coming year and review them in my blog. 

Until next time,






Image courtesy: goodreads.com


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