Chinese New Year

The Chinese New Year is a terrific event idea or troop meeting celebration, to teach the girls about Chinese culture and traditions. A troop can also choose to represent China for Thinking Day, or use these idea's during a meeting in the month of February to celebrate Thinking Day. The Chinese New Year generally falls between the end of January to the middle of February. The Chinese New Year in 2015 will be February 19th and the year of the Goat/Sheep. Because the Chinese calendar is lunisolar, the Chinese New Year is often referred to as the "Lunar New Year." You can order Chinese New Year patches for this event and you can get the girls patches that represent the year of their Chinese Zodiac. I have provided links to order patches and to look up the girls Chinese Zodiac sign. I have organized a sisterhood at Disneyland to celebrate the Chinese New Year on February 1st, 2015. California Adventure will have parades and festivities celebrating the Chinese New Year. Come out and join us if you live in the Southern California region. Have fun celebrating the Chinese New Year with your troop!
                                                 
                                                       New Year's Eve Dinner                                                        
The New Year's Eve dinner is the most important dinner for Chinese. Normally this is the family reunion dinner, especially for those with family member away from home. In the New Year's Eve dinner, normally fish will be served. Dumplings are the most important dish in northern china. These two dishes mean prosperous. Other dishes are depending on personal preference. The majority of Chinese will have New Year's Eve dinner at home instead of restaurant.
                                                               Dumplings
Dumplings are very popular in Northern China. It is one of the main dishes for New Year's Eve dinner. Very few people in Southern China serve dumplings in New Year's Eve dinner.
                                                                Fireworks
Fireworks are used to drive away the evil in China. Right after the 12:00PM of the New Year's Eve, fireworks will be launched to celebrate the coming of the New Year as well as driven away the evil. It is believed that the person who launched the first Fireworks in the New Year will get good luck.
                                                                 Shou Sui
Shou Sui means after the New Year's Eve dinner, family member will normally stay awake during the night. Some people just stay until the mid night, after the fireworks. According to tales and legends, there was a mythical beast called the "Year". At the night of New Year's Eve, the "Year" will come out to harm people, animals, and proprieties. Later people found that the "Year" is afraid of red color, fire, and loud sound. Therefore, at the New Year's Eve night, people will launch fireworks, put on some fires, and stay awakes the whole night to fend of the "Year".
                                                               Red Packets
Red packet is a red envelope with money in it, range from one to a few thousand Chinese Yuan. Usually the red racket is given by adults, especially married couple, and elderly to young children in the New Year days. It was believed that the money in the red packet will suppress the evil from the children, keep the children healthy, and long living.
                                                          New Year Markets
At the New Years days, a temporarily market will be setup mainly selling New Year goods, such as clothing, fireworks, decoration, foods, small arts, etc. The market is usually decorated with a large amount of lanterns.
                                                                 Small Year
Small year is the 23th or 24th of the last month of the year. It is said that this is the day the food god will leave the family to go to the heaven to report the activity of family to the Emperor of the heaven. People will have some religious ceremony to farewell the food god, including take down and burn the paint of the food god. After the New Year's Day, people will buy a new paint of the food god and post it at the kitchen.
                                                                   Cleaning
A few days before the Chinese New Year, people will do a complete cleaning of the house and house ware; means get rid of the old and welcome the new. In old days when bath is not often, people will normally take a throughout bath to welcome the New Year.
                                                                  Decoration
After the cleaning, people will decorate the house to welcome the New Year. Most of the decorations are red in color. The most popular New Year decorations are upside down fu, dui lian, lantern, year paint, papercutting, door god, etc..
                                                     Chinese New Year Greetings
Happy New Year Wan Shi Ru Yi: means everything follow your will Ji Xiang Ru Yi: means harmony and follow your will Sui Sui Ping An: means harmony and safely year around Gong Xi Fa Cai: means Congratulations and be prosperous. Mostly used in southern China.
                                                       Chinese New Year Crafts
There are thousands of different types of New Year crafts in different part of China. The following is just a list of the most popular items.

 Upside Down Fu: The most popular Chinese New Year crafts are probably the upside down character of "Fu". "Fu" in Chinese means luck, happiness, and prosperity. The upside down means coming. So this craft means luck, happiness, and prosperity is coming. Usually the "Fu" is written on a diamond shape paper with red background. People normally post the "Fu" on front door or on the wall of the living room.

 Dui Lian: Also called antithetical couplet. It is a pair of lines of poetry usually hand written on red paper and pasted on the front. The two lines correspond in their metrical length and some properties of each character, such as meaning and tone. The ideal for a duilian is to have few words but deep meaning. For this reason, they use one character per word, as in much Classical Chinese.

 Lantern: The type of lantern used in Chinese New Year is usually decorated with red paper shell. Some lantern has candles inside for illustration. Most are just made of red paper for decoration purpose only. In Chinese New Year, the lantern is usually hanging in front of the door or inside the house. In some part of China, lantern is a must for Yuan Xiao festival (15th of the first month of the traditional Chinese calendar).

 Year Paint: Year Paint is a piece of big hand drawing paint. Usually, the size is at least 3 by 3 feet. Normally the Year Paint is hanged in the most prominent place of the living room. The most popular subjects on the paint are mountains, tiger, long living god, children, etc. Papercutting Papercutting is a piece of art that cut from paper, usually red paper in China. Most popular subjects are animals, human, flowers, or the character of "Xi" means happiness. In Chinese New Year, most papercutting were stick on windows, some are placed on wall or front door.

 Door God: A door god is a Chinese decoration placed on each side of an entry to a temple, home, business, etc., believed to keep evil from entering.

                                                     Chinese New Year Activities                                                     Before the New Year's Day: Shopping, cleaning, decoration New Year's Eve: Family dinner, Shou Sui, Launch Fireworks

 First Day of the New Year: In some place, people stay at home on the first day. In other place, people greeting each other, especially younger people will visit and greet the older relatives and friends.

 Second Day: Some people will host some religious ceremony to honor the gods. Married female will visit their parents. Third Day: Ceremony to honor the ancestors

 Fifteenth Day: This is the Yuan Xiao festival, also called lantern festival. This is also the end of the New Year celebrations.

For more information about the Chinese New Year: Chinese New Year Information

To Order Patches: Advantage Emblem Patch Store

Chinese Zodiac: Chinese Astrology Signs


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