The Yule Log Growing up, the Lonne family did a lot of the same things that everyone else in Minnesota do during the holidays. We cut down our own tree, we drew names for holiday gift giving with our cousins, and we always had a lot of good food to eat. However, my absolute favorite family holiday tradition is our Christmas Eve/Christmas morning festivities. Every year we go to our church’s evening candlelight service, come home, cry while watching “It’s A Wonderful Life,” and then, we wish on our yule log. To be honest, as a 90s baby, I first heard about this tradition when I was about 5 years old after having seen the movie “Beauty and the Beast Enchanted Christmas.” My sisters and I made our parents do it
[L TO R] Author Shelby stands next to her
sisters Carly and Abby. | SHELBY LONNE-ROGENTINE
with us and we’ve been doing it every year since (over 20 years now). The tradition of the yule log is that my dad picks out a log from his wood box near my parents’ wood-burning fireplace in their living room. We then each take a chance to silently hold the log and make a wish on it. Then, either Christmas Eve night or Christmas morning, we burn the log and let our wishes out into the world with the swirling smoke from the chimney. I’ve since looked up the origin of this tradition but the Wikipedia page is pretty vague. It has European descent and used to be used on the 12th night of Christmas as a kind of “good luck for the coming
year” thing. Wherever it comes from, I’ve always really enjoyed this tradition of ours and hold it near to my heart. As I’ve grown up, Christmas doesn’t have this overpowering, jittery, magical feeling like it used to when I was a kid. I still love having a cinnamon roll and coffee and opening up gifts with my family Christmas morning, but I also don’t feel the need to get up at 5 a.m. But the yule log wishing and being together still captures that bit of magic for us, even my sisters and I who are all now adults. We’ve pulled other loved ones in for this tradition in the years since we’ve started it, and I hope we continue to keep it up for years to come.
Where’s the Turkey Dinner? My mom always made a fabulous Christmas Eve dinner, followed by Christmas music and chaotic opening of Christmas presents. A wonderful evening of celebration. Our house was small, so we all crammed into the kitchen and squeezed along the table for the meal (no dining room in this house). But wow, what a great dinner. Juicy roast turkey with apple stuffing (never Canadian bread-like stuffing). Oven-roasted potatoes, browned just perfectly. Her special Estonian sweet-and-sour sauerkraut. Baked verivorst, a national Estonian dish (other countries have different names for it but the English translation “blood sausage” covers it). And a great selection of desserts including Thunder Bay persians for the kids. And when my dad was still alive, each Christmas he’d pour each of the kids a small glass of Sweet Vermouth for the pre-dinner Christmas toast. Mom’s Christmas Eve dinner was a highlight of the season. Later, once I was married and had three children, the traditional turkey dinner continued at mom’s place on Christmas Eve. 18
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Then, a few years before she passed away in 1992, we arrived at her place, looking forward to that home-cooked Christmas turkey dinner. But when we walked in the door, we knew something was different right away—there was no ‘cooking’ aroma. But mom was super cheerful and smiling like she had a wonderful surprise for us. After some chit-chat, we piled into the kitchen and had a moment of “What’s going on? Where’s the Christmas turkey?” The plates were set-up on the Christmas-themed tablecloth—just like every year—but on the table were lots of white closed boxes. Mom’s surprise? Well, she had decided to scrap the traditional turkey dinner and order in Chinese food. That’s what was in the white boxes. From that time on, take-out Chinese food became our new Christmas Eve dinner, even after my mom was gone. Each Christmas, we still chuckle as we reminisce about “Remember when mom ordered Chinese food for Christmas dinner?” Memories.
NORTHERN WILDS
Christmas time was a big deal during our childhood, starting with decorating the Christmas tree to Christmas Eve with turkey dinner, followed by opening the presents. This picture from the mid-1950s was taken a few years after arriving to Canada with me [FAR RIGHT], my sister Molly and brother Tom, with mom hiding behind us. | ELLE ANDRA-WARNER
