Halloween at My House By Zach

By Zach

Every Halloween me and my family do a haunted house. But we do not do our entire house, we only do our  garage. This year will be our 6th year of doing the haunted house (garage). In our haunted house,  we use a lot of animatronics to scare people. Our animatronics jump out at trick-or-treaters because the ghouls sense movement. We have some that jump and some that are standing and shout out scary noises.

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Picture by: Joel Carpenter

We also do a haunted graveyard for the little kids.  It is not as scary. The way that we normally work it is that my mom does the graveyard, and I sneak up behind people in the garage. When they reach for the candy,  I scream at them and that activates the animatronics and really scares them. This year we are using other things besides candy that have no sugar. That is our normal Halloween.

 

 

Holiday post by Zach

 

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In my family, we do a basic Christmas celebration. On my mom’s side we pick a theme for the presents. This year, we picked a color (purple) and the presents have to be purple. On my dad’s side, it is normal gift giving for Christmas. This year I am not getting any gifts from my relatives because I asked them to give to penguinpower.info (my website), which helps the penguins of Mystic Aquarium.  

 My family also spends a lot of time on holiday photo cards. My dad is completely obsessed with taking pictures throughout the year for this card. For the last two years, I have done my own card for family and friends. This year, I did a penguin card to for my donors and friends.

In addition to the holiday fun, we take a trip. It has always been inside of America and it is a mystery trip. My dad plans it, but doesn’t tell us where we are going. He tells us what stuff we need to pack. Most of the time we go to different parts of Florida and we normally include a penguin encounter.

This year, I am very excited because I am working on a special penguin project with Mystic Aquarium for the holidays. You will need to visit my blog in January to see what we did.

Christmas By Joanie

Hi,

My family tradition is, gathering with my family Christmas Eve and hanging out and talking. I get to open one present that night too!  Next morning when I wake up, I call my grandparents and tell them that they can come over now. When they arrive we all gather by the stockings and take down ours then open them! Then we walk to the Christmas tree and we each pick one of our gifts to open first! I always pick the biggest one first. After we open all of the gifts, we hang out by the tree for the rest of the day and have fun!

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Christmas By Justin

 

                                                                          What I do for Christmas

This year for Christmas, I will go to my grandmother’s house. When my family and I are there, we hang out and relax. For dinner we  have appetizers. We eat bread and dip, sugar cookies, eggnog and veggies. We also eat Cheese, crackers, and grapes. All of that food is usually on the dining room table. When we are  finished  with eating,  we go to the living room and sit down and talk. I’m looking forward to this Christmas because I like spending time with family and getting gifts.    

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What I do During the Holiday Season! By Olivia

   Holiday blog post

During Christmas , my family goes to NYC. We get there on Christmas eve and sleep at my aunt and uncle’s house.  My aunt Polly makes a wonderful dinner, and we all eat. I love celebrating Christmas because it’s a fun way to get together with family members. After we sleep over at their house, my grandmother and grandfather ( on my mom’s side ) come over. Once my grandparents have arrived we can open our stockings! I love opening stockings because you never know what you’re going to get. We have a big breakfast and then we open presents! I like seeing people’s faces when they open the gift I gave to them. This year I am not only going to go to NYC, but I am going to Florida as well! In Florida I am going to see my grandmother, aunt and uncle ( on my dad’s side), and it will be so much fun. While we’re in Florida, we are going to Universal studios! I really love Christmas and I am excited for this one.

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                                                    Picture from Pexles

 

Holiday Post – Annie

My family and I celebrate Christmas even though we’re not Christian. I love Christmas; not just for the presents I like it because it’s a time to see family and give love and many more reasons.

Every year my parents and I put up a tree. We have a fake tree because if we get a real one our cats might eat some of it and get sick. We decorate the tree with many different lights and ornaments. We have special ornaments that we put at the top and just pretty looking ornaments at the bottom. We have a big gold star to go on the very tip of the tree. We also like to decorate the mantel. We have a stocking for me, my mom, my dad, and the dog. Then we put some more lights and pictures up there too.

I get an advent calendar every year so in the morning on every day of December I wake and eat a chocolate!
Usually I get one really big present and the rest are small. This year my big present  is custom riding boots from Argentina. I can’t wait to get them! Every year on Christmas eve I am allowed to open one present, I usually pick the biggest one. Overall Christmas is my favorite holiday!

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My Holiday By Violet

During the holiday season, my family celebrates Hanukkah. My part of the family isn’t religious like the other part of our family, neither my sister or I went to hebrew school or are having Bat Mitzvahs. On the eight days, we light each candle on the menoura  night by night and give presents to each other. Traditionally, every night we’re supposed to say a prayer; instead we just say it the first night because we only know one of the prayers. We sometimes spin dreidels and play the game (even though we barely know how). Hanukkah is celebrating the rededication of the Holy Temple. We give each other chocolate coins called gelt, which now come in lots of flavors.

 

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Holidays by Eden

I celebrate Hanukkah for the holidays. Then my family and I pick out a menorah out of our many lining our cabinets. Everyday for the 8 nights we light a candle. My family always lights the candles after dinner, usually before dessert. Another thing I enjoy a lot is for the 8 days we light candles we exchange small gifts. For example, some chocolate coins or a card. The last night we give the biggest present, it’s always different.  Usually at least for one night relatives and or friends come over for dinner, lighting the candles, and having fun! We play games like the dreidel game, and get chocolate coins from it! I usually win against my parents.  Those are most of the traditions my family and I have been doing, and will be doing for as long as we can!

Here is a link to a site on some Hanukkah traditions and basics:

Hanukkah Basics/Traditions 

 

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Holiday Post BY Zacharias

I celebrate two holidays. The two holidays that I celebrate are Hanukkah and Christmas. Hanukkah is a Jewish holiday that involves God. The part that I like about Hanukkah is that you get a kind of chocolate that is called gilt. It has an eight day span to it and there is a special thing to show each and every day. This special thing is called a Menorah. It holds eight candles and you put one candle for each and every day.

 

Christmas is a completely different story. Christmas is a Catholic Christian holiday. You probably think about it as Santa and presents and a and all. Really Christmas is about the birth of Jesus and not Santa Claus and a Christmas tree but I like to think about it too. Those are the two winter time holidays I celebrate.

The Appearance of the Menorah Base in the Time of the Second Temple only The Appearance of the Menorah Base in the Time of the Second Temple - please no copy pictures - used only for study Daniel via Compfight

Holiday Post – By Adam

 My family celebrates the holiday of Christmas around this time of year. A few days after Thanksgiving, we go to pick out a Christmas tree. We bring the tree home after and decorate it as a family. Since my sisters are both in college, the holidays are nice because everyone comes home and we all get to be together. My mom sits my sisters and I down at a table to write our lists to Santa a few weeks before Christmas. On Christmas Eve my mom reads The Night Before Christmas before we go to bed. The next morning, the first person that’s awake has to wake up everyone else so we can all open the presents together…even if they wake up at 5 in the morning. Around noon on Christmas Day we go to Church. We spend the rest of the day making our Christmas dinner all together. After dinner we go to bed and that’s the end of our Christmas celebration. If you would like to learn more about Christmas just visit this link. Happy holidays everybody!