Christmas trees
After reading a few posts about people´s Christmas tree dilemmas, I thought I´d relate to our own.
Every year the plan is to have a simple tree, with glass balls, old Black Forest wooden ornaments and apples. Quite obviously, that never happens. We are not of the colour theme brigade ( simply because my mother wouldn´t want to bother with buying new ornaments each year to fit a theme). We don´t have a theme at all, except that aforementioned feeble wish for simplicity.
we dont have garlands .. we used to when my sister and i were little and made some ( the type where you make little rings out of tinfoil or other shiny stuff and then string them together, chainmail style) but as soon as we were a bit older they got banned. We have a few tinsel pieces that my mother insists must go on the inside of the tree so it "sparkles from within" :D The same goes for horribly ugly red sparkly baubles that we got from some catalogue as a present.
We also have clear lights AND real candles. Yup. That is because when my sister and I were small, we lived in an old farmhouse with an all-wooden livingroom and were quite inquisitive children. So candles were a no no. Now that we are grown my mother wanted to have normal candles, but my sister, father and I insist on fairy lights aswell, because they make the tree twinkle, are much easier to "light" and you can have them on as much as you want without having to change candles. So the compromise is we have both.
Another ting we have double is tree tops. My sister is two years younger than me and we both had the same arts and crafts teacher who never changed her repertoire. Therefore we have two tree top angels and both ( plus the star, occasionally) have to go on the top. Still. I am 20 now.
The specialty that I have is that I want to buy a crippled tree every year, mainly because of that Hans Christian Andersen fairytale where the tree is so happy when it becomes a christmas tree. I always think the crippled ones want to be happy, too!
this year my family bought a tree without me -_-. I have to add that the cripple trees were not the kind that look like one branch with five needles - my compassion has it´s limits. They just had one ugly side ( can be turned to the corner) or two tops or something like that. Humanitarian - or tree-itarian - me... :D
So this year the madness is just about to begin. i will put up a picture once we have lived through it.
Happy winter solstice and Christmas to everybody! :)
Every year the plan is to have a simple tree, with glass balls, old Black Forest wooden ornaments and apples. Quite obviously, that never happens. We are not of the colour theme brigade ( simply because my mother wouldn´t want to bother with buying new ornaments each year to fit a theme). We don´t have a theme at all, except that aforementioned feeble wish for simplicity.
we dont have garlands .. we used to when my sister and i were little and made some ( the type where you make little rings out of tinfoil or other shiny stuff and then string them together, chainmail style) but as soon as we were a bit older they got banned. We have a few tinsel pieces that my mother insists must go on the inside of the tree so it "sparkles from within" :D The same goes for horribly ugly red sparkly baubles that we got from some catalogue as a present.
We also have clear lights AND real candles. Yup. That is because when my sister and I were small, we lived in an old farmhouse with an all-wooden livingroom and were quite inquisitive children. So candles were a no no. Now that we are grown my mother wanted to have normal candles, but my sister, father and I insist on fairy lights aswell, because they make the tree twinkle, are much easier to "light" and you can have them on as much as you want without having to change candles. So the compromise is we have both.
Another ting we have double is tree tops. My sister is two years younger than me and we both had the same arts and crafts teacher who never changed her repertoire. Therefore we have two tree top angels and both ( plus the star, occasionally) have to go on the top. Still. I am 20 now.
The specialty that I have is that I want to buy a crippled tree every year, mainly because of that Hans Christian Andersen fairytale where the tree is so happy when it becomes a christmas tree. I always think the crippled ones want to be happy, too!
this year my family bought a tree without me -_-. I have to add that the cripple trees were not the kind that look like one branch with five needles - my compassion has it´s limits. They just had one ugly side ( can be turned to the corner) or two tops or something like that. Humanitarian - or tree-itarian - me... :D
So this year the madness is just about to begin. i will put up a picture once we have lived through it.
Happy winter solstice and Christmas to everybody! :)