My wife has a particular affection for the Swedish version of the Italian Saint who carried Dante through Purgatorio. Lucia, wonderfully potent and tragic as so many of the canonized women are, is commemorated in our favorite European country in a variety of ways, including meatballs and lindenberry preserves, a crown studded with candles (now gratefully with bulbs instead of flames), and the eldest daughter serves her parents breakfast in bed.
Our two oldest decided to celebrate by making us breakfast in bed. The 6-year-old told us to let her take care of it herself–she didn’t need our input. We reminded the 4-year-old to beware the toaster oven, and let them at it (breakfast didn’t start until 9.30am).
The menu:
a plain piece of white bread
a frozen bagel
a piece of white bread with a smear of strawberry cream cheese.
a piece of buttered toast, cut neatly into two identical pieces
a slightly less frozen bagel with butter and jelly
a toasted half-bagel
two spoiled kiwis
two ripe bananas
apple cider
6 hard-boiled quail eggs (we’ve started keeping a supply in the fridge because the kids love them)
two bags of Beehive cheese curds (dill, yum)
a constant stream of commentary “Dad’s eating it. Mom liked that one.”
and a lot of merry cavorting on our rickety old bed. We finished about an hour later, our sheets filled with crumbs and eggshell fragments.
By Common Consent, a Mormon Blog 
I am CRYING because I’m laughing so hard. That is absolutely the breakfast in bed of a loving 6 year old chef. Great family. Great commentary. God bless Santa Lucia.
Awesome.
My mom, who is part Swedish, would make my sisters and I dress up in Santa Lucia garb and she’d drive us around to her friends in the ward to deliver singing and Christmas baked goods. We hated it, but in retrospect, we must have been awfully cute.
My kids do Lucia day at school as well as home. Somehow, though, *I* got stuck doing the baking. 4 dozen saffron buns later, it wasn’t seeming so festive–next year I’ll be sure to remind the kids of the authentic version of the celebration :)
That’s cute. I remember that I wanted to start that tradition after reading about it in the American Girl doll series (the Kirstin doll).
I was always kind of afraid of the Lucia tradition because I have lots and lots of hair. The whole fire thing was slightly terrifying. Even though we’re committed swedes, I don’t remember ever getting roped into it.
We celebrate St. Lucia’s Day (and St. Andrew’s Day, and St. Nicholas’s Day…we’re big into making the Christmas season as tradition-drenched as possible) at our house as an excuse to break out the hot irons and make rosettes, which are essentially funnel cakes. It’s a Danish custom, not a Swedish one, but close enough. (Lovely post, by the way; thanks for it.)
I love St. Lucia day! And I love how you actually let your kids serve you. I’ve never been able to not micromanage as much. :-)