Days of our Lives: A Look Back At Classic Christmas Episodes

As the season gets colder, and the days longer, soap fans long for a holiday filled with nostalgia, family, and drama from their favorite daytime shows. Soap Hub takes a look at a few standout episodes of Days of our Lives from Christmases past.

Classic Christmas Episodes For Days of our Lives

A Horton Family Tradition
Every Days of our Lives fan looks forward to the holidays in Salem. The writers always know how to play the heartstrings, especially when it comes to the Horton family traditions. To many of the die-hard DAYS fans, Tom Horton (Macdonald Carey) and Alice Horton (Frances Reid) will always be the heart of Salem even when they are not physically present. In 2010, writers made a special note of Julie Williams (Susan Seaforth Hayes) continuing the annual Horton tradition of hanging ornaments on the tree. She tenderly placed Alice’s ornament next to Tom’s on the tree while a lingering image of Alice’s empty chair was shown, leaving fans with a warm feeling of nostalgia from DAYS’ Christmases past.

A Christmas Story To Remember
Every year a different Salem resident reads The Christmas Story. Writers give different characters the honor of the annual reading. In 1983, little Carrie Brady (played by Andrea Barber) slipped on some ice, broke her arm, and fell into a coma. Although he was on a very risky undercover mission, thanks to his ex, Anna (Carrie’s mother; played by Leann Hunley), Roman Brady (Wayne Northrup) snuck into his daughter’s room and read her The Christmas Story. It was both heartwrenching and heartwarming. Spoiler Alert: the young Brady went on to make a full recovery.

A Healing Musical Interlude
December 2001 found many citizens from around the world emotionally shattered and still reeling from the terrorist attacks on 9/11 in the United States. Days of our Lives channeled the collective grief with an emotion-packed episode featuring specially placed ornaments interspersed on the Horton’s family Christmas tree with an instrumental version of O Little Town of Bethlehem playing in the background. It was poignant and powerful and just what we needed.

A Bo and Hope Wedding
Christmas weddings are common in the world of soap operas but it was Hope Williams (Kristian Alfonso) and Bo Brady’s (Peter Reckell) Christmas Eve wedding in 2000 that was a standout and a miracle. A beautiful remarriage planned for the iconic DAYS couple was almost ruined by a Burger Barn drive-thru fiasco. Hope, Jennifer Horton (Melissa Reeves), and Julie Williams (Susan Seaforth Hayes) made a pit stop before the winter wedding and spilled ketchup all over her dress. Hope made it to her wedding looking gorgeous as ever and the rest is history!

Merry Mayhem
Not all Christmases in the soap world are full of love, joy, and miracles. Sometimes there are lies, mayhem, and murder…and that can be fun too, depending on the writers’ execution (no pun intended) of the storyline. Case in point, take the 2013 Days of our Lives Christmas episode that found Santa in the Square, who was also an avid birdwatcher, stumbling upon Sami Brady (Alison Sweeney), Kate Roberts (Lauren Koslow), Gabi Hernandez (Camila Banus), Will Horton (Chandler Massey), Sonny Kiriakis (Freddie Smith), and Ari (Harper and Sydnee Udell) offing Nick Fallon (Blake Berris) by the river. Lucas Horton (Bryan Dattilo) was getting it all on camera. Proving it is not all ornaments and Alice’s donuts that make the holiday memorable. A little blackmail and chaos can make a lasting impression too.

Days of our Lives (DOOL) airs weekdays on NBC. Check your local listings for airtimes. For more about what’s coming up in Salem, check out all the latest that’s been posted on DAYS spoilers, and for an in-depth look at the show’s history, click here.