Google joins the festivities with holiday doodles

Google on Monday announced the arrival of the festive season of December with a series of interactive doodles marking the global holiday season. The series will continue till January 1, 2018.

December means family and holiday travel, and Google's -- 'Tis the season' -- features a new series about a family of birds travelling south.

Two penguins, a "pair of slippery-footed siblings", have been introduced with a set of seasonal candles. They are "excited to spend time with their warm-weather relatives", a toucan and a parrot, according to Google.

"Stay tuned over the next couple of weeks to see what kind of fun this feathery family has in store," the post said.

The first slide shows the penguin-siblings telephoning their parrot pal living in the more vibrant, tropical region.

The second slide shows the penguins packing their suitcases inside their icy igloo for a trip to meet their friends.

The doodle's final panel includes a past photo of the reunited family as well as a pile of wrapped gifts that hint at the series' next installments -- December 25, Christmas Day; December 31, New Year's Eve and finally, January 1, New Year's Day -- that will pick up the penguins' adventures as they travel to warmer climates to enjoy.

The Google Doodle was born in 1998 when the search engine founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin drew a stick figure behind the second 'o' of Google. It was a message that they were out of office at the Burning Man festival.

The company has since decorated the logo to mark cultural moments.