Texas New Year Customs (Wucheng Chapter)

Spring Festival

The first day of the first lunar month is the Spring Festival, commonly known as the New Year. The 30th day of the 30th lunar month (the 29th day of the lunar month) is the Chinese New Year's Eve, also known as "Chinese New Year's Eve" or "Chinese New Year's Eve".

The Spring Festival is the most grand festival of the year and the day when the whole family is reunited. After the 20th day of the Waxing Moon, relatives from other places returned to their hometowns one after another, and people in their families began to buy New Year goods and buy New Year supplies. Twenty-three days ago, the house was cleaned, called "copying the house". Many farmers painted the façade and painted it with paint and color, giving it a new look. In the countryside, steamed dry food, called steamed piles, is popular before and after raiding houses, that is, pasta for preparing for the New Year. Chinese New Year's Eve morning, people cleaned up the inside and outside of the house, posted New Year paintings, couplets, antian gods, hung up the master 's (family tree), set up tablets, put offerings, burned incense burners, and men filled the tank with water, calling it "robbing money." In the afternoon, women wrap dumplings and use them for breakfast on the first day of the first month. In the evening (some before lunch), the elders of the family led their children and grandchildren to carry incense sticks, burning paper and firecrackers, to the village head road entrance to insert incense, burn paper and set off firecrackers, and invite the deceased ancestors to go home for the New Year, commonly known as asking grandparents. Chinese New Year's Eve night, the whole family gathers and drinks and talks until late at night. In the old days, Chinese New Year's Eve had the habit of collecting debts, and the debtors could not repay them, so they had to go out to hide their debts, and only dared to go home on the first day of the first month.

In the early morning of the first day of the first lunar month, every household is brightly lit, firecrackers are set off, incense is burned, paper is burned, and vegetarian dumplings are used to worship the gods and ancestors. Before breakfast, the juniors prostrate to the elders before eating dumplings; after the meal, men and women (married women) wear a new dress, first go to the near door to the branch to pay homage to the elders, and then go to the neighboring neighbors to pray for the New Year. On the first day of the first year, it is forbidden to clean, move scissors, do needlework, do not draw water, pour water, and do not eat meat. I still eat dumplings for breakfast in the second year of the first year. After the meal, men and children of various clans gathered in the streets, set off firecrackers, and then went to the graves of the ancestors to burn paper and set off firecrackers, which was called "sending grandparents". On this day, less than three years after the death of the elder, the married daughter, niece, and granddaughter must return to the mother's house to go to the grave and pay homage to the living elder. In the third year of junior high school, a girl who has been married for less than three years is accompanied by her husband back to her mother's house to pay respects to the New Year. From the third to the tenth day of the first year, it is the time of skewer worship, and the fifth day of the first year must eat the "broken five" dumplings, which means that the troubles are broken.

Lantern Festival

The fifteenth day of the first lunar month is called the Lantern Festival, also known as the "Festival of Lights". On this day, we will send the gods, and the family will wrap dumplings and worship the gods. When offerings to the gods, firecrackers are fired, incense is burned and paper is burned to show the gods to send them off. Dinner was eaten very early, and most of them ate dumplings (some villages at noon). At night, the houses are brightly lit, fireworks are set off everywhere in the streets and alleys, children and young people carry lanterns, hold candles, and play freely; villagers play with dragon lanterns, drums, stilts, rowing dry boats, rolling lion bags, and carrying flower poles to enjoy until the evening of the seventeenth. On the fifteenth day of the first month, a girl who has been married for less than three years must return to her mother's house for the festival, and is not allowed to be in her in-laws' house, saying that she cannot see the lights and fires of her in-laws' house, and there is a saying that in her in-laws' house, "see the lamp to die in the father-in-law, and see the fire to kill the mother-in-law".

New Year 16

This day is a day for elderly women to go to the wild to play, climb hills, walk green, collect firewood, boil water and wash their feet. Young women who have been married for three years return to their mother's home, climb the slope to work, cross the road, and in ancient times they were called to take a hundred diseases, and now they still maintain the habit of women going to their mother's house.

New Year 25

On this morning, before the sun came out, the family used grass and wood ash to draw circles in the courtyard, called "hoarding". Wheat is placed in the hoard, called wheat hoard, and the wheat is covered with bricks and tiles, incense is burned, paper is burned, and firecrackers are set off to pray for a good harvest of wheat. Eat cakes for breakfast, call the bottom of the hoard, and still celebrate this festival.

February 2

The second day of the first month of the second month of the lunar calendar, commonly known as the day when the dragon raises its head. In the morning, the procedure is the same as that of hoarding on the 25th day of the first month, and the hoarding is filled with grains and grains. Before the sun came out, men, women and children had the habit of eating "scorpion claws" ("scorpion claws" are a food that soaks soybeans in salt water and then stir-frys them in sand), which means to avoid being bitten by scorpion stings for one year. Eat dumplings (meaning silver shell) for breakfast, and eat sticky cakes (meaning hoarding hats). On this day, men and children must shave their heads and get haircuts, which means to look up and avoid disasters, and Pepsi will go well. Girls who have not been married for less than three years must return to their mother's house to celebrate this festival, if the daughter-in-law has a saying in the in-laws' family that "the mother-in-law died on the second of February".