Happy Holidays!

So with Jeff being brought up celebrating Hannukah and me with Christmas, the question is what do we celebrate in our house? Around here, we call it Hannumas (a.k.a. Christmakah). We decided not to choose one over the other, but rather to embrace both. We continue to celebrate both mostly out of cultural tradition, as our current beliefs are more Buddhist and Integral in nature. But the holiday season just brings such a wonderful and warm feeling of togetherness as a community, and creates such a great excuse to spend time with family.

Jeff does not have the desire to decorate for any holiday - he sees it as a bit of a waste of time and energy since we'll just have to take them down later. But years ago, I finally started putting up holiday lights in our home. This is one of my favorite aspects of the holidays. I just love the soft glow of the lights and the ambiance they create. Three years ago, Jeff finally realized how much joy decorating for the holidays brings to me, so he went out and bought me a fake tree (a real one would be impossible for him to justify, as they are so messy and a big hassle).

My compromise, in order to stay true to our Hannumas theme, is that the tree is decorated with silver and blue. We still don't have a tree topper - do you think they make a Star of David Christmas star? Some other decorations we have are a winter bear sitting next to a Hannukah bear. My personal favorite is our stuffed Santa holding a dreidel.

So the other question is, what do we say to other people when out and about during the holiday season? My father, being a person who likes to ruffle feathers, insists on wishing everyone a "Merry Christmas" because he refuses to give in to this PC world. "Happy Hannumas" would not only confuse people, but excludes other holidays such as Kwanza. "Happy Holidays" certainly encompasses everything, so we usually go with that, but I find it a bit generic.

So, this year I think we'll go with, "May you have a very happy holiday of your choosing!"