Celebrating Danish Christmas with the Daughters of Norway: Thank You, Leah and j.r.!

Thank you, thank you to my Gather friends Leah Christensen and j-frugal mom-r. for helping me put together the music for the Daughters of Norway Danish Christmas program! You are the best! Thanks to your help, our group was able to learn some of the musical traditions of Danish Christmas and sing and act them out.  I had some work to do to copy out lyrics to the songs and even the music to one of them. My guitar-player friend Diane and I were able to get together three times to work on the pieces.

Our program was originally supposed to be the Sunday before Christmas. Unfortunately, the weather was so cold and snowy that we couldn't do it that day, so we put it off for a week. This Sunday we had our program and party...

After the short business meeting, and initiation of new members, our program began. Elsa J. and her husband Rod processed walking and dancing into the room with a walking tune, dressed in their Norwegian bunads (folk costumes). Then the Christmas tree was decorated by everyone with ornaments, chains and flags of Scandinavian heritage. During this time, Diane, harmonica player George and I (on fiddle) played Scandinavian walking and dance tunes, which we morphed into American Christmas tunes/songs.

When the tree was fully decorated, I handed out the lyrics to two Danish songs: Pa Loftet Sidder Nissen Med Sin Julegrood (In the loft sits the pixy with his Christmas porridge), and Hojt fra Traeets Gronne Top (High on the Christmas Tree's Green Top) (my apologies for not being able to insert the proper diacritical marks). We practiced saying some of the verses to each song, and the members walked around the tree doing their best to say the words. Between these two songs we did a dance called "den Toppede Hone," or "The Crested Hen." This is a simple dance for three people in which everyone can participate. It matters not if you have too many men or women! All can dance. George got up to help teach the dance, so with three teachers, it was easy to learn.

After these three songs and dances, we enjoyed a potluck of Scandinavian foods. What a fabulous smorgasbord! Salads, pickled herring, shrimp, open-faced sandwiches, pea salad and many sweet baked goodies graced our table. And the coffee and juices were plentiful! We enjoyed an extended time of fellowship with each other. We have a wonderful blend of Scandinavians and Scandinavian-Americans.

Then it was time to clean up and put away decorations until next year....

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There was a write-up in the Peninsula Daily News about us today; often these are posted only a short time:

http://www.peninsuladailynews.com/article/20081229/news/312299991

(and for your information, my name was mis-quoted!)

One of our members put together this photo show of the event, if you're interested (and I hope you can access it):

http://www.photoshow.com/watch/Ki4RJ7Ur

Here is the original article/query I sent out to Gather a month ago:

http://www.gather.com/viewArticle.jsp?memberId=268168&articleId=281474977521386

The Daughters of Norway is a pan-Scandinavian organization for women of Scandinavian heritage. Cultural programs are open to the public.