DECK THE HOLIDAY'S

   The Thanksgiving holiday is right around the corner and major cities throughout the country are finalizing parade preparations for the big day.  Thanksgiving parades are as much a holiday tradition as turkey, football and pumpkin pie.  Get ready to enjoy giant character balloons, marching bands and dance troops making their way through the city streets while Santa follows behind, ushering in a festive start to the Christmas season.  Thanksgiving parades are a fun and family-friendly way to celebrate one of the nation's oldest traditions.   New York, New York:    The grandest of all Thanksgiving parades, The Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade , in New York City is the country's largest and most recognized Thanksgiving parade.  Now in the 82nd year, the parade attracts more than three million spectators and upwards of 44 million television viewers.  If you're planning to be in the New York area over Thanksgiving, the Macy'...

   As the Christmas season is fast approaching, I thought it might be interesting to delve into the history of the holidays.  It turns out that there are many myths, false tales, and little known facts about the Christmas holiday and I thought I would share some of these.  The tradition of Santa being pulled by reindeer began in the 19th century when a group of people moved from  Norway to Alaska with a heard of reindeer, who were later used to pull sleds with Santa on them for an advertising campaign. Rudolph the Red Nosed reindeer was invented in 1939 by a man working for a department store, previous to this there had only been 8 reindeer. In North American tradition, Santa Claus lives at the North Pole.  However, in Denmark folklore he lives on Greenland, and each country on the Scandinavian peninsula has an area in which he is told to reside. The X in the abbreviation X-mas is derived from the Greek letter Chi which is the first letter of Christ's...