I'm new too

[Prancer]

Hello everyone. This is my favorite time of year because its when the holidays start. Christmas is my favorite of them all. I am from Michigan. I am 31 years old, married with a 12 year old daughter. I look forward to chatting with everyone.

[christmasdiva]

Hi Prancer! I'm from Michigan too. Anyway, I'm 23 with a 2.5 year old daughter. This will be her second Christmas. I'm also looking forward to the upcoming holidays. I hope to talk to you on the board soon. Have a good one!

[GreenElf]

Greetings Prancer and Christmasdiva, I intro myself on another page but I'm 28 years old with a 11year old daughter & 4 year old son. I love Christmas and I can't wait for the colder weather, holiday music in stores and the smells of the season. I am holding back from wrapping all the present I bought throughout the year until it gets closer to the time. I live in Nova Scotia Canada and it will be our second Christmas in our house so I really look forward to decorating it all up.. Cheers & Merry Merry

[santa claus lapland]

Hi Prancer. I'm 38 and have a 13-year old daughter named Daniela. We live in the town of Rovaniemi, Arctic Circle, Lapland. We love Christmas - but we have to for 2 reasons:

1. We have snow cover for about six months of the year here

2. This town is home to the real Santa who gets around a million letters and another million visitors every year.

If you don't believe we have the real Santa - see how many reindeer live on the North Pole and compare to how many reindeer live here! In fact, we have a population of about 180,000 people and 220,000 reindeer that roam freely around Lapland. I bet you a million bucks you will see our Santa on TV, wherever you are!



We spent last year in Holland and he was on TV repeatedly, same goes for the UK. Wish we could get more US visitors here, but I suppose we are too far away. Someone told me Americans don't get very long holidays - is this true? We get 5-6 weeks every year here!

[GreenElf]

WOW 5-6 weeks vacation!!! thats would be sweet. I am not American but I am Canadain and anyway fortunately I work at a place where I get the same amount of time off as the school children and usually runs from about Dec 22 - Jan 3rd or something like that. Most people usually have to schedule their yearly vacation at that time but does take away from vacation time that they saved up all year and for alot of people who like to have a summer vacation I am sure this is a hard choice.



Personally I have always wanted to visit Finland as my grandmother was from there and it was her first language. She has past on now and I had not a chance to find out much details of that part of my family but a dream of mine is to visit there and search out a long lost chapter of my family and actually meet.



The reindeer sound amazing. That must be so magical to see them roaming the land (or is it Tundra where they are). I suppose you must be use to it by now but I know we have reindeer here too but now around where I live. What a strange and wonderful world we live in.

[santa claus lapland]

Wow! You have Finnish relatives - what a small world. Do you remember from which town?

[GreenElf]

Well no, I have asked my mother but she only knows minmal stuff because apparently they changed their name when they came to Canada I think one was named Papa Neami or something like that... does that sound like a name? I will have to try and find you some more info...perhaps I could ask you a few questions if I end up finding out where they came from....

[santa claus lapland]

Papa is probably "Pappa" and means "Grandfather", "Neami" would be "Niemi" and is a very common surname in Finland. I also have relatives in Canada, but I know little about them, too!

[GreenElf]

....well that would be something if it turned out we were related way down the line! LOL...

[Dudley]

hello from Ontario, just across the lake from you in London...

I'm, 47 and a grand father...and love this time of year....of course, my tradiitons are a bit DIFFERENT...the kids come over to my place about three days before and work over a pinata that is built like a Christmas tree..I usually wind up working Christmas, so we do it early...

I get the pinata started this weekend, the stuff to fill it with has been ordered today...

[JACKRYAN592]

HELLO EVERYONE, IMY NAME IS JACK AND I AM NEW TO THIS SITE. LOOKING FORWARD TO EXCHANGING WITH YALL!!