Advent Calendar - December 1, 2007

The Christmas Tree

Did you have a real tree or was it artificial? How big was the tree? Who decorated the tree?

Today's questions deal with Christmas trees. Here is a brief summary of contributions from fellow bloggers and links to their individual posts:

Jessica at Jessica's GeneJournal describes her family's tradition of decorating their Christmas tree and how it changed as she and her brother got older. My Family's Christmas Tree tells of how they took on more responsibility of adding lights and hanging ornaments as the years went by.

Chery over at Nordic Blue has a beautifully written tribute entitled Little Living Tree in Richmond to a "living tree," its duty as her childhood Christmas tree, and wondering what it's doing now.

Personally I can't imagine Christmas without snow - and living 20 years in California was tough around the holidays. But in White Christmas submitted by Denise over at Moultrie Creek hadn't seen snow until she was in her mid 30's and writes about her first christmas in Germany. Read her story of Christmas markets, holiday foods, and how the novelty of snow quickly wore off!

So which popular Christmas movie would best describe your family? At West In New England you'll be laughing and singing Oh Christmas Tree, Oh Christmas Tree! once you read the article by Bill West.

I'm jealous of Steve over at Steve's Genealogy Blog. His family had the type of tree I secretly craved as a kid: an artificial tree with white needles. In The Great White Christmas Tree you can almost hear the "whrrrrr" sound of the color wheel.

Terry Thornton up in the Hill Country of Monroe County, Mississippi writes of the hunt for the "right" christmas tree in The Christmas Tree. Although Terry's hunt nowadays is up in the attic, he helps us remember a time before trees that grew "in the polyester forest of Taiwan or China."

There are some wonderful photos of various trees in Our Christmas Trees by Apple at Apple's Tree. Like many of us, her first memories are of live trees and then the transition to some great artificial trees.

Christmas in California, a topic that I enjoyed, can be seen at The Christmas Tree by Randy Seaver over at Genea-Musings. He recounts all the trees he remembers, from his aunt's unique manzanita tree to his parents' and grand-parents' traditional Douglas Fir trees.

Jasia at Creative Gene reveals some of her parents tricks for handling a live tree in Oh Christmas Tree. And like so many of us participating in this meme, she talks of relatives with the cool aluminum tree and the color wheel as well as her own switch to artificial trees.

In my first post, in All Trees, Bright and Beautiful I've written about all the different Christmas trees I remember and how I keep coming back to those big, tall, live ones.

Colleen over at The Oracle of OMcHodoy offers us a look at the wonderland set up under the Christmas tree in The Christmas Tree. We never had a village or nativity under our tree but the ones that Colleen remembers have been passed down through the family and they sound like fun!

Two posts are offered up by Janet: Christmas Trees - Past and Christmas Trees - Present. At Janet: the researcher she recalls a large 7-foot live tree of her past and shows us her current spiral tree that helps bring in the holiday spirit.

Diane offers us The Christmas Tree over at CanadaGenealogy, or, 'Jane's Your Aunt'. She remembers her father waiting until Christas Eve to get their live tree and how they would decorate it that night.

And finally Lori over at Smoky Mountain Family Historian has a great post about Christmas Trees and the switch to not only artificial trees but artificial trees with pre-strung lights.

Check back tomorrow for more submissions on the next topic: Christmas Tree Ornaments