What Is The Deal With Pickles On Christmas Trees?

Maybe I live under a rock, but I've never heard of this. 

Now that the Christmas season is here, people are starting to decorate and get in the spirit. We're not quite ready to do any decorating yet, but I thought I'd nose around online and see if there were any fun ideas I could steal next time the girls are in town.

Then I saw it - a glass pickle ornament. I kind of recoiled at first, and wondered, "What in the ever loving heck?". But yes, this is a thing that people do.  They have an ornament that's shaped like a pickle, and they put it on the tree Christmas morning or late Christmas Eve.  The kid who finds it first usually either gets an extra present from Santa, they get to open their present first, or they have good luck all year - depends on who's doing it, I guess.

Being the curious person that I am, I started looking up where this came from and how it all got started. I read that some people think it comes from Germany, but apparently that's not altogether true because the German people don't know this tradition. Some people say it started in Woolworth stores in America in the 1800s, as a way to promote glass ornament sales.

Another tale says that it came from an old legend. In this story, a shopkeeper had locked away two innocent kids in a pickle barrel, and St Nicholas found them and set them free. They ran home for Christmas Dinner and put a pickle on the tree in thanks. Sure. That seems normal. I'm trapping kids in pickle barrels every other Thursday.

Do you put a pickle on your tree? Do you have any ornaments that you have to hang every year, because it's tradition? Tell me all about it!

Pickleingly yours,
Behka