Classics for Beginners discussion

I have been listening to Charles Dickens' short story "A Christmas Tree"

http://www.classicreader.com/book/876/1/

It got me to thinking about my own memories of the Christmas tree from my own childhood. My earliest Christmas memories go back to the 1970s.

We had an artificial tree with many different colored lights. The garlands were shiny and metallic and came in purple and emerald green and turquoise! There was a shiny lit star on top. We had ornaments that were mass produced but also some that my sister and I had made at school from popsicle sticks and glitter!

We would go to my grandpa's house every Christmas morning for breakfast. We had cinnamon rolls and sausage and scrambled eggs. Every year, he had mandarin oranges and, to this day, the smell of those oranges remind me of my grandfather.

What are some of your memories?

Mine go back to the 50s. We had a real tree with a Lionel train under it. Nothing says Christmas for me like the smell of a live tree and the whiff of ozone from the train. Great memories!

So true! We always had an artificial tree as we had allergies. But smells always trigger the biggest memories for me.

Kirsten wrote: "So true! We always had an artificial tree as we had allergies. But smells always trigger the biggest memories for me."

As an adult because of allergies, we have had to go to an artificial tree, and we don't have the room for the train. But not all is lost, I find the Christmas lights on the trees to be very helpful with the winter time blues. We leave our tree up until April! Hell of lot cheaper than Prozac and no side effects! You can't do that with a real tree.

LOL! That's great. Maybe I'll try that. I have a little tree down here in the basement, and my mom has a full size one upstairs. Though, I miss the multi-colored lights and the metallic garlands that we had on the tree when I was a kid.

On my little tree, I have multi-colored lights, but just gold garlands. Upstairs, it's all white (garlands and lights) and I feel that's a little too sterile.

White lights are an abomination!

I always do all white lights on my little tree, but they're off-set by all the colorful handmade ornaments, mostly ceramic and cross-stitched.

Growing up, we had live trees a few times, but usually an artificial one. As others have noted, they're better for allergies. Also not as alluring to cats. We had a lot of the mass-produced ornaments, as well as those made in school, etc. Every year, my sisters and I also got to choose a new ornament of our own, so we each had a small box of our own ornaments by the time we finished school.

LOL! While the tree at our church, with white lights and just red and gold ornaments etc. is beautiful, I much prefer the multicolored lights. That's all there was when I was growing up eons ago.

Usually my husband and I put up our tree, which has little white lights on it, and decorate it with garland, decorative balls, and all sorts of special ornaments. My parents started giving me and my sister ornaments every Christmas while we were growing up. When I moved out on my own, they gave me the set of ornaments that were mine; my sister got hers when she moved out. So I had a full set of ornaments for my first Christmas tree that I had while I was growing up. But, this year the tree looked so pretty with just the white lights that we decided to leave it like that. It's also a way to take some of the stress off and enjoy the holiday more.

Christmas is very different for my family compared to how it used to be. I've gotten married and moved out and my middle sibling moved out also, so it's just my youngest sibling at home. On top of that my parents are going through a separation so the family visits are different too. We used to decorate the tree together and open presents on Christmas morning. Then we'd spend the day at my dad's side. We'll still be going to my dad's side on Christmas day, but I miss doing the little things like decorating the tree and watching Christmas episodes each night of December with the sibs. On the bright side my youngest sibling and I started a new tradition of decorating a gingerbread house each year. This is our fourth consecutive year. It's one of the good changes in the midst of a couple bad.

Catherine, I love your ornament tradition. My husband and I have bought an ornament each year we've been together. We try to make it something special from our year overall. I love the idea of extending that for the kids, though! Very neat tradition.