The stockings were hung by the chimney with care,
In hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there.
This week’s quote is from A Visit from St. Nicholas, by Clement Clarke Moore, 1822.
Stockings are a favorite Christmas tradition. When I was growing up, stockings were just for kids, but it seems now everyone gets one.
The story goes that in the 4th century CE good old St. Nicholas dropped some coins down the chimney of needy families and the coins just happened to slip into stockings hanging near the fire to dry. The idea caught on and eventually expanded into a Christmas Morning tradition. The first Christmas stockings would have been everyday plain but, by the early 20th century commercialized pre-packaged stockings were for sale as were embellished stockings.
I was recently reminded of the joys of Christmas stockings by a blog post, The Holiday Stocking written by Becca Carr from Tatter, a textile library located in Brooklyn. Tatter offers classes and unique items for sale, all to do with fabric. They also publish a journal and a blog called The Fold.
Here’s to Christmas stockings!
My grandmother gave me a pearl necklace. It took her, like, 25 years to give it to me, because she gave me one pearl at a time. That was the old tradition – the way that families could afford nice things. So when I was little, every Christmas and birthday I’d get one pearl, and she’d add it to my string. When I was eight, I had eight pearls on a string. I remember being like, ‘Why another pearl every holiday?’ – an ungrateful kid, basically who never even wanted a pearl necklace. But by the time I got the complete strand and had a moment to reflect on it, I was like, Wow. It took her years to give me that gift. It was so beautiful and powerful, something that I was completely not grateful for, all those years, and then amazed by her persistence. In my twenties, my apartment on Elizabeth Street got broken into; the necklace was stolen. But I have it in my mind, in my heart, so it’s fine – I got the gift. 
OverDressed for Life 