The twelve days of Christmas are the days between Christmas Day and Epiphany (6th of January) and represent the length of time it took for the wise men from the East to visit the manger of Jesus after his birth.
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US scientists calculated that Santa would have to visit 822 homes a second to deliver all the world's presents on Christmas Eve, travelling at 650 miles a second.
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The tradition of putting tangerines in stockings comes from 12th-century French nuns who left socks full of fruit, nuts and tangerines at the houses of the poor.
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The definition of a white Christmas in the UK is for a single snow flake (perhaps amongst a shower of mixed rain and snow) to be observed falling in the 24 hours of December 25th.
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Louis Prang, a Bavarian-born lithographer who came to the USA from Germany in the 19th century, popularized the sending of printed Christmas cards. He invented a way of reproducing color oil paintings
, the "chromolithograph technique", and created a car
, the "chromolithograph technique", and created a car
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Gold-wrapped chocolate coins commemorate St Nicholas who gave bags of gold coins to the poor.
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In 1999, residents of the state of Maine in America built the world's biggest ever snowman. He stood at 113ft tall.
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