[graciegirl]

I would love for you to tell me about your Christmas tree.

When I was a kid, it was absolutely believed in our home that you must have a Balsam of more than six feet tall for your Christmas tree. Other people had shorter bushier Scotch pines. I don't know if it was Catholic or Protestant thing....but when I was a kid I figured that it might have something to do with it.

I am an absolute Christmas tree lover. We had a big real one for years and now we have a big fake one. It has only red lights for our son in law. It was his earliest Christmas memory. We had little trees in the kids rooms. Both were white.

I don't know if when we move year 'round to The Villages if I can give up my big tree.

Please tell me about your Christmas tree(s). MY neighbor in Hadley has 6 in her Whispering Pine model. I knew I loved her when I laid eyes on her.

[swrinfla]

graciegirl:

Grew up with the notion that Santa put up the tree. After many years of doing that, my parents quickly allowed that they did it!

As we brought up our kids, my wife and I maintained a number of traditions stemming from our childhood trees.

1) Must, of course, be balsam or spruce.

2) Must be as fresh as possible.

3) Must be at least 9' tall (so that I always had to take some off to make it fit).

4) Must have several ornaments dating from as early as the 1920s (which came from my in-laws).

5) Must have lots of tinsel.

6) AND MOST IMPORTANT OF ALL, must have real candles on it!

The candles always were lit Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, New Years Eve and Twelfth Night - at a minimum.

We began with the "put it up as late as possible" attitude. Over the years, we adopted the "not before the 18th, no later than the 21st" approach!

Now, of course, I have a small fake tree, pre-wired with colored lights. I still decorate it each year, but it takes me about an hour, not the two days of St. Louis days!

I have abandoned the candles, sadly - although I still have a few holders!

I may have to abandon tinsel, at least this year, as The New Kitten is a terror and will eat every strand and may well destroy the tree, too!

SWR

[l2ridehd]

We always had a fur balsam tree because of the great smell. My mother started a Christmas tradition when I was very young of making a homemade tree ornament every year. When anyone visited our home during the Holidays, they got to take an ornament home from the special tree. We kids each got two. I now have enough homemade ornaments to decorate the entire regular Christmas tree. This is a tradition I continued after she passed on. I have made angels, reindeer, skiers, snowmen, sleds, elves, stockings, etc etc. Last year we made trains and this years special ornament tree has airplanes with packages to deliver and Santa pilots. Here is a link to a picture of a few past ones and the ornament tree. We put it up around Thanksgiving and build about 50 new ones every year. (tree is nothing more then a dried azalea bush) The one in this photo is from the year we made snowmen.

http://i271.photobucket.com/albums/j...d/IMG_0174.jpg

http://i271.photobucket.com/albums/j...d/IMG_0171.jpg