Old time Bermuda was much different than present day Bermuda, take for instance Christmas traditions. Sure some of our traditions are still practised today just a bit differently.

On Christmas Day families visit one another and share lunch or dinner or spend their time travelling from one end of the island to the other because now-a-days everyone lives so spread out.

In the old days families lived close to one another so Christmas would be celebrated at one house and the stress of travel was eliminated.

All of the women would be in the kitchen preparing the meal and catching up on the events of each others lives. People did not patronise restaurants or even buy their fixings from the stores as today. Mostly everything was home grown from the turkey, chicken, turnips, beets, potatoes, beans and carrots. Neighbours were like family as well and they would share whatever extra vegetables or food they grew.

A special treat was the Christmas pudding which had a pence coin or two baked into it.

The men would play cards in the sitting room, Euchre was a popular game, and would be talking a whole bunch of nonsense for hours. The children would play with budgies which is a large marble, regular marbles and often would play hide and seek.

Games were much simpler then unlike today with all of the electronic goodies, video games and computers.

Gift giving has changed as well. In the old days children mainly received gifts and not the adults as much. Gifts were home made and came from the heart and not from your favourite store or online. Nobody tried to out do each other and it was really the thought that counted.

Let us not forget the time honoured tradition of the Christmas tree. In the good old days cedar trees were abundant and were cut down as close to home as possible then carried home.

There wasn't containers of trees awaiting island wide of every shape and size cut and ready to transport home in your car. Decorations were homemade as well with stringed popcorn for garland, paper rings, paper flowers, and painted cedar ornaments (from previous Christmas trees). Apples were sometimes hung on branches of the trees.

If a home didn't offer a fireplace mantel stockings would be placed around the Christmas tree and filled with apples and oranges with a small piece of chocolate.

Of course stockings weren't fancy like today, they were the children's own stockings.

So as you can see the old time Bermuda traditions have been a bit altered but hopefully not fully lost.

Yes times were much simpler then and people didn't have as much as today, yet they had a lot more than we do today.

Joy and happiness were easier obtained and the true meaning of Christmas was never lost because family love and togetherness always came first. Lets hope some of the old time Bermuda is still alive and well.

Remember to smile, laugh and love one another.

Happy Holidays.