Christmas stockings

Have you been wondering how and when Christmas stockings and gifts started? Well, here is the story behind this Christmas tradition. In 17 centuries ago in Turkey, a bishop of Myra named Nicholas was known for love of children and benevolence. On every Christmas Eve, he used to secretly and surprisingly give gifts to the children in the town. On Christmas Eve, while he passed by a house, he heard a father and three daughters mourning about their poverty. They used to live abundantly but when their mother died of illness and after losing their money in useless and bad inventions. They moved into a peasant’s cottage, they were discussing on how they were not able to be married because they can’t afford nor provide a dowry which was the traditional thing to do at that time. Knowing the grief and despair, St. Nicholas felt pity on them. He looked in the window and observed that they were sleeping. He threw three small bags of gold in the chimney and landed in the stockings that had been hung over the fireplace to dry. St. Nicholas was caught in the act by their father which whom he begged to keep his secret. Guess what? Their father could not help to keep his mouth from telling the incident. The entire village learned from it days later. The three daughters were able to get married and lived happily. After that, hanging of stockings became a tradition on Christmas Eve. That’s how Christmas stockings started.