CHRISTMAS ISN'T OVER

I'm the type of person who hates when things end. Since I was little Christmas ending is something that I always dreaded so I've tried to extend it for as long as possible.

I hate Christmas ending so much that I don't even open all of my Christmas presents on Christmas Day, instead I open a few on Christmas Day and save the rest and open them on the days to come. My mom has even taken to labeling the ones she wants me to open on Christmas Day with a little label on the bottom.

Fortunately, my passion for keeping Christmas going is aided by the Epiphany. I come from a Puerto Rican family who celebrates the Epiphany, also known as Little Christmas, also known as Three Kings Day, also known as Dia de Los Reyes. This is held on January 6th and in many countries and cultures with is celebrated just as much as Christmas. The story behind it is that on the night before the Epiphany, the three kings that brought Jesus his gifts, come around and deliver gifts to all the children. Children leave hay for the king's camels in a shoebox under their bed and the kings take the hay for their camels to eat and leave gifts in the shoe boxes. Now, when I was little the idea of having 3 kings (and maybe their camels) in my room at night absolutely terrified me (as did the idea of Santa coming down my chimney) so now it has become tradition for me to leave the shoebox under my parents bed because it made me feel safer as a child.

But what I love even more about Three Kings Day, besides the fact that it allows for Christmas to continue, is that I get to see all the family I don't get to see on Christmas. This is the only holiday when I get to see my cousins that are my age. My Abuela makes a bunch of different traditional Puerto Rican's dishes and we all celebrate and dance and laugh for the whole evening.
At the end of the night my family has its own personal and funny tradition. Every year my mom buys my Abuela a new snow globe for Christmas. Every year they line my grandparents house during the holidays. At the end of the night on Three Kings Day, we all wind up all the musical snow globes and play all the music as the same time. It's sends us home laughing and smiling every year.

Happy Holidays!