This Year's Tree

Last year, I think I posted photos of our various Christmas trees over the years. I looked at last year's photos and found that this year's tree looks almost identical to how I decorated it last year. It's interesting how our taste changes and evolves over time. Some years our tree was more country looking, some years all homemade ornaments. Now, it's a mixture but mostly it's vintage balls. And we no longer bring in live trees. Maybe one day, but I have to admit the artificial ones are easier and less likely to trigger my allergies. Those were a surprise gift the year I turned 50--I'd never had allergies in my life, but suddenly I was dealing with them.

Some favorite ornaments:

My mother used to make thse beautiful beaded ornaments. I am lucky enough to have a few of them still. 

The white and green ball was made by Mom; the blue one was a gift from my friend Anastasia, whose grandmother made them. Her grandmother was Greek, I believe, my mother English, but both of these ladies did such beautiful work. The white heart ornament was brought back from Germany by my third son, and it's another special favorite.

Vintage balls--these are the ornaments of my childhood, and in recent years I've been finding more of them to add to our tree.

 Another one from Anastasia.

Years ago I grew some cotton--just to try it. It took a long time to be ready to harvest, and fortunately we had a very late frost that year. I had no idea what to do with it once I picked it, then when traveling down south we saw it made into ornaments, so that's what I did. I still have several left. The crochet snowflakes were craft show finds.

This is one of my cherished ornaments--we made these in 1966, each of us children writing our names in glitter on a glass ball, along with the date.

Maybe a World War II-era ball? This was in an auction lot. I found some interessting history about the ornaments produced during the war on this website.

I bought this little Spode dog this year from my friend Detra who sells vintage things from time to time.

The little bear was one of Tommy's first ornaments, given to him by my mother. It used to play We Wish You a Merry Christmas, and Tommy called it his "singing bear." It no longer sings, but it still makes me smile.

Oh, and the bubble lights! I added these last year, and I just love them! Such a silly thing, but there it is.

Merry merry, everyone!

Copyright Susanna Holstein. All rights reserved. No Republication or Redistribution Allowed without attribution to Susanna Holstein.

Christmas Trees Past

I was looking through some old photos this evening, and found several of past Christmas trees. I thought it might be fun to put them together in one post. So, in no particular order:

2010--our first "Charlie Brown" tree in years. I still like these kinds of trees; maybe next year we'll get another one. These are simply field-cut trees from somewhere on our property--not perfect, fairly bare in fact, but so easy to decorate. And they hold well too.

2011, and another Charlie Brown tree. The new bookshelves too the spot we'd been using for several years so we got a smaller tree.

2002, before the log room was built. Finding a post for a tree in our small house was always a challenge. This was an artificial tree, I believe, bought because my allergies were so bad then. This one was all gold and white with bits of red; I don't theme my trees these days, preferring all the colors instead of just a few.

2005, just after the log room was finally complete. We were still using the same artificial tree, but it seemed a lot smaller in the log room.

And this year's tree--full of balls and color!

Oddly, I could not find photos from every year since I've been taking them digitally. I am wondering if some were lost when my external hard drive crashed. How sad that would be! But as it is, my photos seem to be scattered all over the place on this computer and I can see I need to do some serious organizing if I am to find anything in the future.

It was fun looking for them anyway, and traveling back through memories of so many life events. Not quite as nice as looking through an album, but almost!

Copyright Susanna Holstein. All rights reserved. No Republication or Redistribution Allowed without attribution to Susanna Holstein.