How many of you knew that today, January 6th was the Feast of the Epiphany?? I feel sorry to say that I am in my 23rd year of life and am just now learning of this holiday. I am in debt to my new 2010 planner that I purchased a couple days ago. I was having quite a frustrating time finding a planner that I liked until I remembered that I had a gift card for Barnes & Noble and thought that I just might find something there. I was thoroughly excited to find a nice selection of planners all at 50% off! As I was admiring my planner that evening I saw that today was the Feast of the Epiphany. I wondered how I have never even heard of this holiday and what it could be about. Nealy and I decided maybe you just have a big gathering and share epiphanies! This sounded pretty interesting to me, especially if we got to eat some good food to help stimulate the epiphanies. However, I didn't have too much faith in my speculations so I decided to do some research on this holiday. 
And here's what I've discovered: The Feast of the Epiphany is a celebration of God's revelation of Himself to mankind through the Person of Jesus Christ. Sounds a lot like Christmas, huh? Well, it should because apparently it was and may still be celebrated instead of Christmas in some places. It is called Little Christmas by the Irish, Befana in Rome, El Dia de Reyes or Pascua de Negros (Blackman Christmas) by the those in Spain, Cuba and some Latin American countries and who know what else by all the other people of the world!
Not only is it all of those other things, it is also the Twelfth Day of Christmas! That's right, the 12 days of Christmas are after December 25th which means that we have still been in the Christmas season the last 12 days! The reason for the 12 days of Christmas is because it is believed that the wise men followed the star for 12 days to find Christ.
And to celebrate this holiday, you have to have a King's cake.
The King's cake is round to represent the circular route that the wise men took to avoid going back to Jerusalem. A plastic baby is hidden inside the cake because Mary and Joseph had to hide baby Jesus to protect Him from Herod. Whoever gets the piece with the baby in it is the one who brings the King's cake to next year's celebration.
The bottom picture is the King's cake that I made. As you can see, it is not in a circle and the reason for that is because it wasn't forming into the circle as easily as I wanted so I just threw it down in a rectangle. I didn't learn of the significance of the circle until after making it, otherwise I may have tried harder to get mine to work properly.
I have no idea if this thing will taste good but I am anxious to try it! It has a cream cheese filling and lemon flavored icing that sound absolutely delightful!
There is so much more about this holiday that I have yet to learn but I'm beginning to think it just might become my favorite holiday. To think that I have lived every other sixth day of January not knowing of the wonderful time I could be having! I tried having a big Feast of the Epiphany celebration tonight but the short notice made things a bit difficult. So it will just be Courto and I. But next year, oh man, it will be quite a wonderful celebration! You may want to save the date and start a travel fund if necessary!
Here are a few links if you all care to learn a bit more about the Feast of the Epiphany.
6 comments:
Great post, Nicole! That is so funny that you just wrote about this because when we were marketing here in Amarillo yesterday, one lady was telling us that she usually leaves her tree up until at least 12 days after Christmas because in the south they used to celebrate on the 12th day with the King's cake because of the wise men! I had NEVER heard that before. And now I am further enlightened on the subject. Thank you! I will start my travel fund now for next January 6th :)
Glad you enjoyed it, Sonya! And how interesting that you just learned about this wonderful holiday too! I am so glad you've begun your travel fund because I would certainly love to celebrate the Feast of the Epiphany with you!
Wait a minute! If you live out here...we don't need a travel fund! It will make it quite easy to celebrate the Feast of Epiphany together.
That's true! But... there's no guarantee I'll be out there, so you may want to save up just in case.
How interesting Nicole. Maybe that is why I still have my Christmas decorations up. I don't want to take them down. I love looking at the lights. We are snowed in today. What else is new around here
Isn't it interesting?! Yep, you shouldn't take your Christmas decorations down until January 7th, the official ending of the Christmas season. They are quite nice to look at so I can see that it would be hard to take them down. We've been getting a decent amount of snow around here the last couple days and it's so pretty!
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