National Cookie Day
December 4
“Empty?! You took all the cookies!”
“They were crying to get out of the jar… Cookies get claustrophobia too, you know!”
– Charles M. Schulz
“Early bird gets the worm. But cookie taste better than worm. So me sleep in.”
– Cookie Monster
“In the cookie of life, friends are the chocolate chips.”
– Flair Belgie
“Speak softly and carry big cookie. Big enough to share with a good friend.”
– Cookie Monster
Human Rights Day
December 10
“When the fundamental principles of human rights are not protected, the center of our institution no longer holds. It is they that promote development that is sustainable; peace that is secure; and lives of dignity.”
– UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Zeid
Ra’ad Al Hussein
“Where, after all, do universal human rights begin? In small places, close to home – so close and so small that they cannot be seen on any maps of the world. … Unless these rights have meaning there, they have little meaning anywhere. Without concerned citizen action to uphold them close to home, we shall look in vain for progress in the larger world.”
– Eleanor Roosevelt
“There may be times when we are powerless to prevent injustice, but there must never be a time when we fail to protest.”
– Elie Wiesel
Winter Begins
December 21
“I wonder if the snow loves the trees and fields that it kisses them so gently? And then it covers them up snug, you know, with a white quilt; and perhaps it says, ‘Go to sleep, darlings, till the summer comes again.'”
– Lewis Carroll
“‘Hear! hear!’ screamed the jay from a neighboring tree, where I had heard a tittering for some time, ‘winter has a concentrated and nutty kernel, if you know where to look for it.'”
– Henry David Thoreau
“Winter (noun)… the three-month break between a woman and her razor.”
“The fire is winter’s fruit.”
– Arabian Proverb
“I’ve noticed the squirrels are beginning to gather nuts for the winter. A couple of my friends are missing. Are you in a safe place?”
“My favorite winter activity is going back inside and putting my pajamas back on!”
– Garfield
Holiday Season Begins
Hanukkah
Evening, December 2 – Evening, December 10
Christmas –December 25
Kwanzaa
December 26 – January 1
“The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched. They must be felt with the heart. Wishing you happiness.”
– Helen Keller
“Blessed is the season which engages the whole world in a conspiracy of love.”
– Hamilton Wright Mabie
“The joy of brightening other lives, bearing each others’ burdens, easing others’ loads and supplanting empty hearts and lives with generous gifts becomes for us the magic of the holidays.”
– W. C. Jones
“It is tenderness for the past, courage for the present, hope for the future. It is a fervent wish that every cup may overflow with blessings rich and eternal, and that every path may lead to peace.”
– Agnes M. Pharo
New Year’s Resolutions
“Each New Year, we have before us a brand new book containing 365 blank pages. Let us fill them with all the forgotten things from last year—the words we forgot to say, the love we forgot to show, and the charity we forgot to offer.”
– Peggy Toney Horton
“Be at war with your vices, at peace with your neighbors, and let every new year find you a better man (or woman).”
– Benjamin Franklin
“Youth is when you’re allowed to stay up late on New Year’s Eve. Middle age is when you’re forced to.”
– Bill Vaughan
First Crossword Puzzle
Published
December 21, 1913
“The nice thing about doing a crossword puzzle is, you know there is a solution.”
– Stephen Sondheim
“Do I rue a life wasted doing crosswords? Yes, but I do know the three-letter-word for regret.”
– Robert Breault
“Now and then I work crossword puzzles. The harder they are, the more cross words I use.”
– Crabby Road/Maxine
“I have O.C.D. – Obsessive Crossword Disorder.”
– Etsy
Fruitcake Toss Day
January 3
“The worst gift is a fruitcake. There is only one fruitcake in the entire world, and people keep sending it to each other.”
– Johnny Carson
“My husband bought fruitcake one year. He ate some of it, but I wrapped the rest and gave it back to him for Christmas. The next year, I found it amongst my presents from him. It developed from there. This one’s been around 15 to 20 years. The first one lasted about that long, too. Fruitcakes are made to withstand the test of time.”
– Rikki Rosenberg