Advent Calendar - Ornaments Are Memories

Oh have we had a variety of Christmas ornaments.  We have some that the children made in preschool or elementary school.  These included yard dipped in white glue, curled on waxed paper and dried; some with a small photograph; bell cut from construction paper and colored. 

When I was young, Mother made some ornaments out of a flour, salt and water dough.  When my children were young, we also made some.  The dough was colored and then the ornaments were decorated with glitter or thin tinsel.  We still have some of these and they were made about 1983 or 1984.  Many of them broke and were thrown out, but I still have a few of these fragile ornaments.

We have some ornaments from other countries.  Some of them my mother gave us from her travels.  Some Walt and I bought on our travels.  We even have some leprechauns that were meant to be key chain holders.  (I just removed the chain part and key loop and attached an ornament hanger.) 

We also have some bubble lights.  I found some in a catalog a few years ago.  What great memories.  They are not the large ones of my childhood, but they still bubble and keep me entertained.  I still need to make sure that they stand up straight on the tree; otherwise they really don’t bubble well.

I made some tatted snowflakes that also hang on the tree.  My sister made some crocheted ones for me.  So, our tree has many memories of family and travels. 

Do any of you remember the metal key that used to be on the top of cans like coffee and shortening?  And you ended up with a strip of twisted metal?  My grandmother used some of these twists on her tree.  Some years later, in an antique store I actually found a small package of 10 of these, commercially made.  The original price says 10¢.  So they weren’t that expensive, but Grandmother still made her own. 

Because we have an artificial tree, I no longer use icicles made of light-weight foil.  Instead, I have some hand-blown ones that have colored liquid in them.  I also have some that are just decorative hand-blown ones that really look like the icicles hanging from the eaves.  And, because it is artificial, we can put it up early and keep it up until after New Year’s.  And NO dried tree needles stuck in the carpet months later.

Advent Calendar - Oh! The Breakfast (and More)

Christmas morning breakfast was special.  For as long as I can remember we had Merk’s Coffee Cake, a recipe Mother found in one of the Los Angeles newspapers.  It was made in an angel food cake pan;  then later in a Bundt pan.   Dad cooked the bacon and scrambled eggs. 

My grandparents would come for breakfast.  We children (all 5 of us) would open our stockings before breakfast and our one gift from Santa.  The rest of the gifts were opened after breakfast, after everyone went to the bathroom and after the adults had a fresh cup of coffee. 

Dinner was sometimes turkey and sometimes a roast.  We would also have dressing, potatoes gravy (my Grandmother always made the gravy), a vegetable, a green salad, and dinner rolls.  (Do you remember those soft, white ones you got from the store? And then browned in the oven?  Well, those.)

Pies would be served later.  Usually they were homemade, but later Mother would buy they frozen and then bake them. 

Advent Calendar - Fresh & Artificial Trees

When I was a child, we had a real tree and we always bought it from the tree lot run by the city fire department.  Since my dad worked for the water department, we knew many of the firemen.  This was part of our holiday traditions.  As you can imagine, with 5 children running in different directions looking for the “best” tree, getting a decision was a major project.

Once the tree was home Dad would put on the lights.  Struggling with the lights was more like it.  These were BIG lights, and we had aluminum reflectors to go behind them.  And, if one light went out or was bad, then the entire string of lights was off.  During the entire season we had to go back and switch bulbs to see which one(s) were not working this time. 

The 5 children in the family took turns putting on the ornaments.  The special ornaments were attached by my mother and, for years, they were always put up high.  Some of them were her grandmother’s small ornaments, and a few she acquired in other places. 

We also had bubble lights on the tree.  I loved watching them bubble.  Trying to get them to stay up straight, so that the bubbles would rise, was something else we worked on during the entire holiday season.  Again, think of 5 children, and a dog, walking past the tree many times each day. 

Usually my mother and I put on the tinsel: those thin strips of light-weight foil.  Of course, with a dog, some of them always were all over the house.

For some reason I don’t remember taking down the tree and packing up all of the ornaments.   

As an adult, when our children were small, my husband and I would apply for a tree-cutting permit.  Then we would drive (2-4 hours) to the designated national forest.  With 2 children bundled for cold and snow (we lived in Phoenix), we found a tree and cut it.  Most of the time we found out that the SMALL tree that we found in the forest needed at least 10 inches cut off of the bottom once we got the tree home.

Walt, my husband, put on the lights.  Then we all put on ornaments.  Many of them were made while the children were in preschool or they had other special memories.  Every year, I bought or made each child a special ornament. Those ornaments were given to them when they moved out so that they would have special ornaments for their first tree.

We began decorating the tree in the afternoon.  Since we never knew how long it would take, we usually had homemade New England style clam chowder and popcorn for dinner.  Sometimes we finished decorating after dinner.  Of course we listened to Christmas music while decorating the tree. 

Some years later, we bought an artificial tree because we were usually gone for a week.  With the “live” tree, we would return to dead needles that were difficult to clean up. An artificial tree made sense.  And now we can have the tree up for a couple of weeks before traveling, and it isn’t dead when we return. 

Chocolates in an Advent Calendar - Start December 1

Do you have an advent calendar?  Did you have one as a child?  The first one I remember had the Christmas story, one part behind each window.

Then, when my children were in high school, the German Club sold German advent calendars.  Behind each window is a small piece of chocolate.  If you haven't seen these, they are an easy way for children to count down the days of December.

Now, I buy 5 of them for my grandchildren, ages 4 to 17.  I can get them at World Market, and I've seen them at a couple of other stores.  But ONLY before December 1.  Because some of my grandchildren are young, and have a little difficulty controlling the impulse to open more than one window a day, they are hung near the ceiling.  (My son and daughter-in-law are both tall.)  The children were so excited when we took the calendars over to them at Thanksgiving.  Then, this year, we bought one for our daughter-in-law also.  Usually our son doesn't care for sweets.  But, next year, I think we're going to have to find 7.  But what a fun way to have a small treat each night, and quietly anticipate December 24.

Thankful Thursday - Thanksgiving & Family

Thanksgiving has been my favorite holiday for decades.  It was always about family and, of course, great food.  The adults didn't seem stressed or as tired as they were in December.  There was a lot of laughter and joking.  Extended family would come by.  Friends would drop by.  It was just fun.

One Thanksgiving, when I was about 10 or 11, I was allowed to help with the dishes after dinner (before dishwashers).  I really felt grown up because I wasn't shooed away like the younger children, and as I had been in the past.   I wanted to help with the kitchen clean up because the ladies always seemed to have so much fun talking and laughing.  And the kitchen was SMALL.  So they were always "running" into each other.  But it didn't matter. 

Pinal County Genealogy Workshop - Arizona January 2012

The 9th Annual Genealogy Workshop will be held on Saturday, 28 January 2012 in Casa Grande, Arizona.  This event is from 9 to 3:30 and various sessions will be held.  Details on the sessinos and a registration form will be posted soon at www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~azpcg.

Dr. Thomas Jones - 17-18 Feb 2012, Arizona

I just found out that Dr. Thomas Jones will be speaking at the Green Valley Genealogy Society workshop and seminar on the 17th and 18th of February 2012.  For all of the details, use this link. 
http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~azgvgs/seminardetails2012-02-18.pdf

On Friday 17 February Dr. Jones will be giving a workshop limited to 30 experienced genealogists.  On Saturday 18 February, Dr. Jones will be presenting four topics at a seminar and this not limited to experienced genealogists.  I'm certain that at lest the Friday workshop is going to be filled quickly, and perhaps the Saturday one also.  So if you are interested in hearing Dr. Jones, register early.