Happy Lucia

Tomorrow morning we're celebrating Lucia here in Sweden, but it all really starts tonight when we sit up all night. Here's what the Swedish consulate says about this tradition:

The Swedish Lucia celebration is an annual festival of medieval origin, observed on the 13th of December. On this day, the darkness is brightened by Saint Lucia, a creature of goodness and light who opens the door to the Christmas season.

Named after a Sicilian saint, the Swedish Lucia does not have much in common with her namesake. She is celebrated in a variety of ways, but the most common is the Lucia procession consisting of a group of young girls and boys singing traditional Lucia songs.

On her head, the girl or woman playing the part of Lucia wears a wreath of lingonberry sprigs with holders for real candles (battery-powered ones are sometimes a safer option) to give the effect of a halo. She also has a white, full-length gown with a red ribbon around her waist. Her female attendants (tärnor) wear similar gowns and the "star boys" (stjärngossar) wear white pointed hats decorated with stars. Lucia processions are held in various places, ranging from kindergartens and schools to churches and the Swedish Parliament.

Lucia can be perceived as a symbol of the good forces in life and a symbol of light in the dark winter. She usually appears early in the morning, bringing coffee and saffron-flavored buns (lussekatter) traditionally eaten around Christmas time in Sweden.

Me and my fiancée have a tradition we've been doing for a couple of years. Our movie theatre arranges a Lucia movie night. They show three films that haven't been shown yet. Nobody knows what will be shown and that's kind of the thrill. It all starts at midnight and we watch the movies through the night. In between the films we get pizza and sandwiches to eat and in the morning we get "lussekatter". It all ends around 6-7 in the morning. We started doing this a couple of years ago and we've been doing it ever since. Every year we've been seeing how more and more people attend. This year we weren't even able to get any tickets - they sold out in a couple of hours - so we're doing our own version: we rented three movies instead. We took one we both wanted and one "secret" each. He doesn't know what I chose and I don't know what he chose. This way we get our own way of secret movies. We've bought lussekatter in a nearby bakery and will order pizza. With me being sick it actually turned out for the best. I don't know if I would be able to sit in a movietheatre for so many hours.


Moving on to today's card. I got this image of Tilda as Lucia from a friend and made this especially for my fiancées niece in mind. I used a lot of bling to be in the Magnolia down under challange that had "bedazzled" as their theme. I used pink shimmerz on the pink flowers and on the edges around the image. The gown is coloured slightly with light grey promarker to add shadow and then with white twinkling h2o. Leaves are punched from bazzil bling and I added some bling to the edge and center of flower.
I also used a sketch from friday sketchers. It was simple and clean which was perfect to make the papers stand out.
And of course as this is a Christmas card I'm entering it on thejust Magnolia challenge blog.
There is also a monochromatic challenge at a spoon full of sugar. Not sure if they will accept this card, but thought I'd give it a try. I think it's monochromatic with different shades of red.

A better view of all the shimmer and bling.