Christmas is a widely celebrated festive holiday in the United States, and Christmas Day is officially recognized as a federal holiday by the US Government. The Christmas and holiday season begins around the end of November with a major shopping kickoff on Black Friday, the day after the U.S. holiday of Thanksgiving, though the period during which Christmas decorations are present and thematically appropriate music is playing in stores sometimes extends into the period between Halloween and Thanksgiving. Many schools and businesses are closed during the period between Christmas and the New Year's Day holiday, which is a time commonly used to spend time with family and close friends, return unwanted gifts at stores, and shop after-Christmas sales. Most decorations are taken down by New Years or Epiphany. Other observances considered part of the season (and potentially included in non-denominational holiday greetings like "Happy Holidays") include Hanukkah, Yule, Epiphany, Kwanzaa, Lunar New Year and winter solstice celebrations. December 26, popularly referred to as Boxing Day or St. Stephen's Day elsewhere in the Western world, is only known widely as the "Day after Christmas" in the U.S., and is observed in a number of states under that name, but is not a federal holiday. Christmas is known as "Quviasukvik" in the state of Alaska and the Inuit, the Yupik, the Aleut and the Iñupiat celebrates it as their new year.