Welcome back to the playhouse!

I have more Christmas goodies for you!

That is, more true stories of ghosts, hauntings, and other paranormal phenomena on or around the Christmas holiday! Enjoy!

WHAT WOULD CHRISTMAS be without a few good ghost stories? Next to Halloween, thanks to Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol", it might be the holiday most associated with ghosts and the paranormal.

So it might be no surprise that every year, we can present stories from readers who have had ghostly encounters and other paranormal experiences on or around the holiday season.

Consider these true tales of truly haunted Christmases...

GREAT-GREAT AUNT'S CHRISTMAS HAUNTING

By Jim T. @ about.com



"These events occurred in Toronto, Ontario in December, 2009. I had just started seeing a new girl and she invited me over for dinner a few days before Christmas. It was my first time visiting her apartment, which she shared with a roommate who had already left to go home for the holidays.

After dinner, we went out to her covered porch for a smoke. As soon as I went into the room, I was drawn to a curious, faded portrait hanging on the wall. The portrait showed a woman in her late 20s or early 30s, and she seemed have a strange sentience in her stare.

I asked the girl about it, and she said it was a picture of her great-great-aunt, taken in 1907. She took the picture off the wall and showed me the date scrawled on the back of the frame.

Later, we were in her room watching television and I took a bathroom break. The bathroom was adjacent to her room, and it had old plumbing - her sink had dual faucets for hot and cold water. I washed my hands in cold water when I was finished. I am 100 percent certain of it, and I cannot explain what happened next.

After I rejoined the girl, we were talking when all of a sudden, the sound of running water rose from the adjacent bathroom. She looked at me and said, "You left the water running."

"No, I didn't," I told her. "I'm sure I turned if off." And I was. I washed my hands in cold water and I certainly wouldn't leave someone's bathroom without turning off the faucet.

When I got up to check the bathroom, sure enough, the water was running. Thinking I somehow must have left the water running, I went to turn off the cold water tap on the dual faucets... but it was already locked in place! It wasn't turned on!

The hot water was running. I didn't touch the hot water tap when I was in there not two minutes earlier. I am 100 percent certain of it.

Suddenly, I felt an extremely cold chill. The hairs on the back of my neck were standing up, but it's probably just because I got so suddenly spooked knowing some unseen force had turned the tap on.

The girl and I talked about it afterward, and it all came back to the strange picture of her great-great-aunt hanging in the covered porch. She said she had the picture since she was very young, and it had always transfixed her.

She said this wasn't the first time strange things like that had happened - the lights turned themselves on and off, and the television did, too - and that it always seemed to be triggered by a male presence in the house. I asked why. She said she'd see what she could find out about her great-great-aunt.

It turns out her great-great-aunt had committed suicide when her husband left her for another woman.

All I know is, that the hot water tap turned itself on!"

CHRISTMAS HELL HOUND

"There's a strange road I have to take to get back home. There are always weird shadows and other unexplained things that seem to enchant the roadway. One night, I believe whatever it is that haunts this stretch of pavement, may have followed me home...

I was driving home alone, my car filled with Christmas presents, when I began to get near the "haunted" area of road. As I made a right onto the road, a large, shadowy figure darted in front of my car.

 I slammed on the brakes and the truck behind me nearly crashed into me. Shaking, I gingerly placed my foot back on the pedal and continued down the road.

As I came to a bend in the road, it slowly began to climb and my headlights washed over a strange, shadowy creature crouched on the double-lines. It stared at me with orange-yellow eyes, and then it bolted to the right.

Again, I slammed on my brakes and ignored the annoyed honk behind me as I watched the creature, which looked like an enormous black dog, continue to stare at me as it ran across the road and up and over a high fence (that no normal dog could clear). Scared out of my mind, I hurried home.

Sunday night: I was watching TV in my family room with my daughter, who was curled up asleep on the opposite couch. Out of the corner of my eye I saw waves of energy (that's the only way to describe it) seem to generate over the floor. Just black waves.

 Then it felt like someone punched the right side of my skull so hard that I was seeing stars! My head throbbed and I fell to the floor, waking up my daughter.

Clearly alarmed, she asked what was wrong and I said that it felt like someone punched me, but we were the only two home!

Ever since then, I've been getting these horrible migraines and feel as if I'm hallucinating. I'd experimented with acid while in college and that's exactly how these hallucinations seem.

But I have no history of any kind of mental disease and I have never hallucinated in my life!

Has something from the "haunted road" followed me home?

LITTLE CHRISTMAS COMPANION

"We have always assumed our home was haunted and have gotten used to it over the years. It is a historic house on old Hwy 100 west of St. Louis, Missouri. Last year something happened, though, that has us wondering what exactly it is, that haunts our house...

We were in the kitchen talking in the late afternoon after my husband came home from work. He was sitting so that he was looking into the living room and I was looking at him, as were my two children.

Suddenly, the color just drained from his face and he started sputtering and jabbering. When he could finally talk, he clearly he asked, "What is approximately twelve to fourteen inches tall and human shaped, but extremely skinny with big knobby knees?"

I didn't know how to even answer and turned to look, but didn't see anything. We bring it up now and then to discuss, but only among ourselves, as most people don't want to acknowledge such things.

One strange thing happened right before Christmas that has me wondering if it involves our little companion...

The kids and I were making cookies and were standing at the kitchen counter. I dropped one to the floor but felt a slight swish by my pant leg as it fell. I went ahead and emptied the tray, then bent down to pick up the fallen cookie.

No cookie anywhere. There was nowhere for it to go. I had the dog outside so she wouldn't be in the way. I was upset and sure there had to be an explanation!

I made the kids get down on the floor with me and we crawled around. There were no gaps between the cabinets and floor - nothing! I even checked my pants legs to see if it bounced up into them. My kids were wearing shorts and no shoes.

Was that slight swish I felt that little guy having a Christmas cookie? If it was, then he was way too fast for us to see him. But then why did my husband get to see him for just a second before he disappeared?

Am I glad that our house doesn't have ghost... but possibly something else? I don't know. It's all too crazy to wrap one's mind around. But I do swear that this is absolutely true."