Well hello there people of all ages, boys and girls . This blog is about Santa Clauses. Now, many of you may be familiar with your own type of Santa Claus from your own region. However, here in Iceland, we in fact have 13 Santa Clauses, who arrive separately each night from December the 11th to December 24th, when the last one comes to town. And then they all start departing from town, one by one until January the 6th .

Today, the Yulelads are known for being kind, bearing gifts to good children who behave, if they put their shoes by the window. However, naughty children get a potatoe, so that they will be encouraged to do more good in the future, for only kindness and goodwill is rewarded.

But the yulelads did not use to be this way, once in the distant past, they were my country's biggest troublemakers during the Christmas season. Each of them had their own way of terrorizing the populace. Their mother and father and even their cat were no different, being one of the worst you could run into.

Still today, children must be good and not be naughty, otherwise their mother Grýla, who is a big troll, will come with her sack, collect all the naughty children and then go back home with them and eat them. So remember, be nice or Grýla will eat you.

The Yulecat is not a really nice creature either. If somebody does not get new pair of cloths for Christmas, the yulecat will eat those people, for not wearing good new cloths (our culture is a bit brutal and weird).

But these blogs will be focusing on each Yulelad as they come seperately. So let us start with introducing them as a collective, shall we?

Let me tell the story
of the lads of few charms,
who once upon a time
used to visit our farms.

They came from the mountains,
as many of you know,
in a long single file
to the farmsteads below.

Grýla was their mother
- she gave them ogre milk -
and the father Leppalúdi;
a loathsome ilk.

They were called the Yuletide lads
- at Yuletide they were due -
and always came one by one,
not ever two by two.

Thirteen altogether,
these gents in their prime
didn´t want to irk people
all at one time.

Creeping up, all stealth,
they unlocked the door.
The kitchen and the pantry
they came looking for.

They hid where they could,
with a cunning look or sneer,
ready with their pranks
when people weren´t near.

And even when they were seen,
they weren´t loath to roam
and play their tricks - disturbing
the peace of the home.

Now, the first one who comes today, would be Sheep-Cote Clod (Stekkjastaur in Icelandic)

He is known for his stiff legs, not being able to bend them. He comes on the 11th of December, to harass sheep and steal all their milk

The first of them was Sheep-Cote Clod.
He came stiff as wood,
to pray upon the farmer´s sheep
as far as he could.

(Stay tuned for more daily uploads of each Yulelad as the poem continues, if I miss out any days, I will make it up by including them all in one go Merry forward Christmas )

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