The Snowflake Chronicles

Christmas Tree Memories

8 Qawl 163 B.E. - November 30, 2006

I just got finished reading

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and one of the entries brought back memories of my Grandparents. Grandma Newland always put up the Christmas tree after Thanksgiving. My Grandfather would put us all in the car the day after turkey day (that’s what my youngest brother called Thanksgiving) and we would go up town to get a tree.

When we were small my grandparents always had a living tree. After Grandpa bought the tree, we would take it back to their house and decorate it. We didn’t put an angel on top, instead we had a star at the vary top of the tree. The tree always went in the living room, right in front of the window.

We decorated the tree with popcorn strung on a thread. The way we made the popcorn strings was easy. My grandmother would pop the corn and then we would take a needle and thread and run the needle through the popcorn so that it stayed on the thread. Then we wound the strings of popcorn around the tree. In addition to the strings of popcorn, my grandmother would put on tensile and glass ornaments.

The tree was lit with tiny electric lights, the kind that went out completely when one bulb burnt out. Once a bulb burnt out, you had to take each bulb out and put a new one in until you found the one that didn’t work.