With winter arriving, and the cold, dark nights drawing in, our thoughts are quickly beginning to turn festive.
Christmas is on its way and this year, we'll be celebrating like no other after nearly two solid years of the pandemic.
Lights, markets and Santa's grotto, Christmas feasts, clootie dumplings and gluhwein - it's a special time of the year.
The pinnacle of winter, it's hard to imagine a time when Scotland didn't make a huge effort with its Christmas celebrations.
But you'd probably be surprised to know, especially looking at how big a deal Scottish cities like Dundee, Glasgow and Edinburgh now make of it, that it wasn't always so for Scots. There was even a time when Christmas was effectively banned across the country.
Christmas in Scotland
Though Christmas is considered to be a religious holiday, it is actually due to religion that it ended up becoming an illicit activity to celebrate.
Beginning in 1560 when the majority of Scotland split from the Catholic Church, in a period known as the Scottish Reformation, the Yuletide celebrations (which combined the Viking Yule celebrations with the Christian Christmas) were effectively removed from the calendar.
Associated with Roman Catholicism at the time, the Church of Scotland disapproved of them and did not believe the day should be celebrated as it didn't reflect what was written in the bible.
Some sections of the Kirk even went as far as to threaten to excommunicate anyone caught observing the holiday - some were even ordered to make public repentance when caught.
The National Trust for Scotland's Ana Sanchez explained: "If you celebrated Christmas, it was a serious crime. We have records of people being excommunicated and punished that were caught.
"In Glasgow, there was a trial held for five people for celebrating Christmas. Each of them were forced to repent."
Nearly a hundred years later, an Act of Parliament of Scotland in 1640 made the celebrating of Yuletide illegal, leading to most Scots focusing all of their energies on the established festival of Hogmanay - a tradition that echoes to this day.
This ban was officially repealed in 1712, but the Kirk continued to frown upon the festive celebrations - meaning Christmas remained a very muted affair in most Scottish households.
Public Holiday
In Victorian times, the mood of the public towards Christmas had begun to change with growing interest in celebrating once again.
Contact between Scots and the rest of the UK continued to blur the lines, though New Year still remained the dominant holiday in Scotland.
Incredibly, it wasn't until 1958 that Christmas was added as an official public holiday.
However, Scots still had to soldier on working on Boxing Day until it too became an official holiday in 1974.
Even today, many Scots of a certain age still see Hogmanay as the real holiday and Christmas as something of an imposter.
Thankfully, though this year's celebrations will be some of the best in years, you won't face punishment for having a wee mince pie or two.
Scottish Traditions
Though it was banned for nearly four centuries, Scots still have a range of festive traditions.
In fact, the 12 days of Christmas used to be known as the 'daft days' due to how easily people get lost in the revelry.
Christmas Eve is still referred to in many parts of Scotland as “Sowans Nicht”, which is thought to refer to “sowans” – a dish made from oat husks and fine meal steeped in water for several days until sour. This dish was prepared and then shared on Christmas Eve.
The first Monday after New Year's Day was traditionally known as Hansel Monday , with the word 'Handsel' springing from an older word meaning to 'deliver by hand'.
This day was a second day of gift-giving and turned the employee/employer and master/servant role on its head with those higher up offering gifts of money or other small items as tokens of appreciation or good luck.
Other traditions include burning of rowan twigs (to cleanse the house of ill-will) and the role of the first-footer being assigned to the first tall, dark stranger (or friend) to cross your threshold on Christmas Day (though now usually this has been switched to Hogmanay).
Traditionally, they would offer whisky (to celebrate), coal (for the fuel for the fire) and salt and bread, though many instead offered Black buns - a cake made using dried fruits and spices.
They also baked festive treats such as Clootie Dumplings, a traditional pudding - made using cloth (the 'cloot'), Black Buns and of course Dundee Cake.
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