St. Lucia's Day

On December 13th we celebrated St. Lucia's Day. We read the book "Kirstin's Surprise" and learned about St Lucia's Day in Sweden. Traditionally, the oldest daughter rises early and makes breakfast rolls and serves them to the rest of the family, while wearing a white dress with a red sash and a crown made from holly leaves with candles in it. Esther was very disturbed that I did not wake her up at 4am to make the rolls haha. We made the dresses and crowns by hand but the girls were happy with the result. They wanted the looped dutch braids (is there a better word for this hairstyle?) so they could look just like Kirstin in the book. Also we of course could not have only the oldest daughter be St. Lucia so Adele was included in everything too. 

We made Lussekatter, the traditional St. Lucia saffron buns. The name means "lucia kitten" because they look like curled up cats. I had never used saffron before but I found some on amazon. I used this recipe for the Lussekatter and they turned out amazing! I really loved them and I'm excited to make them again next year. Making them was so fun for the kids too. Celebrating this day was a lot of work, but we all had such fun. While the buns were rising we learned more about St. Lucia. It was interesting to learn the story of St. Lucy. (We watched this video which was a bit graphic, but informative). It led to a good conversation with the girls about different religions, and what things we have in common. This day was a lot of work but one that made me very glad to homeschool and be able to make these fun traditions with my kids.  The girls are already so excited to celebrate St. Lucia's Day next year!