This year, Jan 26 marks the day that the Chinese call "Little New Year," which falls on the 23rd day of the last lunar month in North China or the 24th day of the last lunar month in South China, about a week prior to the Spring Festival.

According to folklore, the Kitchen God will go to Heaven to report on a family's conduct over the past year. As a result, people offer sacrifices, such as pig's head, fish, sweet bean paste, fruit, and barley sugar, to the Kitchen God in the hopes that he will say something good about their family.

Between the Laba Festival, which falls on the eighth day of the last lunar month, and Little New Year, families throughout China undertake a thorough house cleaning, sweeping out the old in preparation for the new year.

On Little New Year, old couplets and paper-cuts from the previous Spring Festival are taken down, while new window decorations, New Year's posters, and auspicious decorations are put up.

Traditionally, Cantonese people would prepare cooking oil and deep-fry home-made snacks to wish for abundance for the new year.

Cantonese people traditionally enjoy visiting Spring Festival flower fairs, so that they can take home a few auspicious plants. Each flower has its own auspicious meaning. For example, peach blossoms signify romance and a happy marriage, while tangerine trees are seen as auspicious because the pronunciation of tangerine (桔) "gat" sounds the same as 吉 ("gat" or auspiciousness) in Cantonese.

Vegetables with auspicious meanings are also welcomed by Cantonese people. For example, 生菜(lettuce, or sang-coi) sounds like 生财 (fortune, or sheng-tsai) in Cantonese, while芹菜 (celery, or kan-coi) sounds like 勤力(diligent, or kan-lik) in Cantonese.