Holidays
San Diego’s mild winter climate makes it an attractive spot for people who don’t want a white Christmas. So that means there is a good chance you’re hosting out-of-towners over the holidays. That means that …
This year, the Lickona family is keeping to its Christmas traditions at home: the ancient carols, the crèche, the Christmas lights wrapped around the cactus in the front yard, the works. But also this year, …
This New England girl has finally adjusted to the warm weather Christmas season. It only took 20 years. During those years, I felt patronized by fake snow painted on windows, manmade snow hills, and ice …
Holiday lights make the early darkness of winter a beautiful thing. One of my favorite displays in San Diego is the simple strings of colorful lights that wind around the railings on the streets above …
Growing up in the Chicago area, the holidays meant snowy hills and hushed landscapes, warm, woolly scarves and mittens, puffy down coats and sturdy boots. It also meant shoveling two feet of snow off the …
Dear Hipster: I’m super burnt out on the whole “holiday shopping” scene. I went to the movies in Mission Valley the other day, and I’m still having flashbacks from the sight of cars practically running …
I read somewhere that the reason you’re sad around Christmastime is because it’s a reminder of what you’ve lost since childhood: the belief that the world is a magical place that is interested in your …
This year, I plan to add some snow fun into the holiday season. But waiting for snow to dump on a nearby mountain on a day that the family can get up there can get …
Native Scene The beasts of Jerusalem will murder him, but in the meantime the beasts of Bethlehem warm him with their breath. — Giovanni Papini Nights are still cold on the starry hillside; Dew still …
“I wrapped one with the Sunday comics, one in an old map, one in a beautiful silk scarf...”
Charles Dickens wrote at top speed, in part because of gifts that didn’t seem so at the time. In his youth, he was a court stenographer. He learned the intricate Gurney system of shorthand in …
Dear Hipster: I almost always have a really hard time buying gifts for people. Birthdays are tough enough, but this time of year is all but impossible, seeing as how there are so many people …
You don’t have to be a movie critic to know the cinematic cliché: you don’t get to choose your relatives, but you do have to spend the holidays with them. And hey-ho whaddya know: every …
Either way, Santa Rancho Bernardo The 125-year-old Bernardo Winery keeps a holiday traditions alive at its Rancho Bernardo vineyard, where its Holiday Nights events run December 11th through the 14th, from 5:00–9:00 p.m. Lights and …