Christmas tree thread !

[neptuneguy27]

Chris, your trees are just beautiful. It must take you a lon

Thank you Terry. It takes me about 2 days to put up and decorate the trees. The tree in the living room takes the longest ( about 6 hours total ) as it is the largest one. Sometimes I cheat and will put the one in the den up the night before Thanksgiving but I wont decorate it till after. My goal is to have the whole house decorated in that weekend before I go back to work on Monday. That's been a tradition for me ever since I was a teenager. So thats been a while. lol. I didn't do as much this year as I normally would because I am leaving for vacation Friday and will be gone all next week. So I may do more when I return. Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

Chris

 

[lederstiefel1]

being religious

Hi Steve and Seamus!
Before I tell you what the tree comes from - something about religion and me...
I meanwhile have become a total atheist and once was a strict catholic (how could I ever be so silly and naiv?) as brought up in a stricly catholic family....
But I like Christmas, although there's all that bric-a-brac, but I really do like the mood and the sentiments and smells of that time - it makes live more colourful and gives it a certain miracle touch....
So now we can close the circle to the tree.

Mostly all the decoration and dos during that time are actually heathen stuff, so is the tree as well. The old Germans practiced that tradition to keep bad winter ghosts and gods out of their homes and keep a small twig of life (green) like a sullen resistance to a time of snow, cold, hunger and often death. They "protected" doors and the wind-ows (= wind-eyes = smoke escape holes under the roof, today better known as windows, as their houses had no real, modern windows...!) with twigs of fir-tree or mistel-toe, bound into chaplets and garlands. Inside the house was often put a tree which was later even lit with candles to welcome the light-god and keep the light as a pledge against the winter darkness. Easter, which was once the feast of the solstice, these winter decoration was burnt, what we call nowadays Easter fires. Also puppets were burnt together with the twigs and trees which were place-holders for the " father winter", and Carneval is the time to make much noise to shoo away the bad winter ghosts and to welcome the sunlight/summer again.
Later the christian church tried to fight these rites during the christianitisation but didn't succeed at least! Therefor they adopted them instead and gave them christian meanings (X-mas, Easter, etc.) and linked the dates with dates from the christian calendar.
Actually all these rites we do now are deeply heathen rites and much older than the church.

The X-mas tree was introduced into the anglistic world by Queen Victoria (same as the marriage in white) because her German husband brought it to Britain and she liked it so much that she introduced it in the British Court during mid 19th century.

Ralf

 

[toggleswitch]

 

[chachp]

Here is ours

.

 

[northernmary]

Ours Went Up On The First December

This Year we bought a Black Christmas Tree with bright white led’s NorthernMary

P.s
I’d like to wish you all a merry Christmas and a happy new year!!!

 

[DADoES]

RJ's tree, with pool and back yard lights in the background.

 

[bendix5]

Beautiful trees by everyone. I do like the litho of the dancing people Christopher in your red room. I have seen it out here in art shops. My wife and I do love our tree and wish we had more room in this house for more. Our ceiling is not as high as our Oregon house was so we have to leave off the top and put on the santa. Bubble lights at the top are 48's. One string of 8 by Noma. Still a favorite of ours. I had somewhat of a problem with the camera and focus but here it is. Everyone have a very Merry Christmas and a safe and Happy New Year. Love to you all, Dan and JoEllen (Bendix5)

View attachment 12-5-2007-22-55-15--Bendix5.jpg

 

[bendix5]

I will try the picture again Dano

 

[rapunzel]

For anyone interested, here is a link to a website that explains the origins of the x-mas tree. Thank you for your input Ralf - I knew there was a lot more to Santa Claus than 'HoHoHo'. BTW, Santa's 'Hos' seem to be causing a little controversy of their own this christmas. A proportion of the female population seem to think it's directed at them. Personally, I blame the Jerry Springer show.

I, too, wish to express my amazement and enjoyment of everyone's photo contributions to this thread. All these trees are absolutely stunning and it is so nice to see that people still put so much love and effort into these festivities. Gadgetgary's bottle tree has a very special resonance, as christmas in Oz is a time of beach parties, barbecues and, of course, beer. We have a couple of bottle houses around the country and that tree would be just the thing for them. I've tried to take a photo of my tree with my cellular, but can't separate the jpeg file from the email to post on here. I really need a digital camera - that reminds me....'HEY SANTA, I KNOW WHAT I WANT FOR CRHISTMAS!

Gleaned from a recent internet article, black x-mas trees are apparently all the rage here in Oz right now. They say 'black' goes well with people's new 'minimalist' interiors. Last year it was upside-down trees - weird, but wonderful.

Toggles, you've got the cutest smile ). (Hey, you like my beauty spot?!)

Merry X-mas and all that goes with it to all you good folks.

Cheers

Rapunzel

http://www.christmasarchives.com/trees.html

 

[lederstiefel1]

Hey - that is interesting!

Hey, Rapunzel, that is intersting stuff!
Never heard of that before! Guess not many people here in Germany know about that!?

Have learnt again something! Thank-you!

Cheers, Ralf

 

[tlee618]

Dan, your tree looks great, lots of neat ornaments there.

 

[toggleswitch]

Yes mine is a little one.

So where is yours Terry?
I see this fabulous tree with gold ribbon and angels, lots of angels............

Mine was the one you saw on GadgetGary's snack table, above. It was a gift from him that somehow never made it to my house! *LOL*

 

[toggleswitch]

.....and I LOVE that ceramic tree!

 

[veg-o-matic]

This year's model

Which looks surprisingly like last year's...

 

[veg-o-matic]

Hohman, Indiana

Not shown is my Major Award in the window. I find it quite irritating that the sign on the school says "Cleveland Elementary School" when we all know it was the Warren G. Harding school.

veg

 

[lightedcontrols]

Dano!

Love the bubble lights! Several years back I did a 22 foot tree with the vintage c-6 bubble lights. Every few days, one would burn out even though I wasn't burning them full bright and was using a dimmer. I was all season in that tree looking for the burned out one! It was beautiful, but I won't do that again!!! Mark LOL!!!

 

[tlee618]

Hey Steve, I have a 9'tree with 1,200 lights, lots of gold ornaments, crystal, and a few angels. Also a mixing of ornaments both old and new. One of these days I will learn how to post pictures!!! I promise. Veg, I love your tree with the colored lights. I have clear ones but next year I think I'll do a second tree with the colored lights. Just look so Christmasy!!

 

[askomiele]

OMG You are already in the mood. Here it is illegal to set any christmas decoration until the first of december. Becaus christmas comes after 'Sinterklaas'. Our tree will be present next week or so

 

[~sudsshane]

Our Christmas Tree...

my favorite time of year!

 

[tlee618]

FINALLY, Thanks to Robert for coming to visit me today you will now have a picture, just like magic. The first picture is of my front doors.

 

[tlee618]

The next two pictures are of my tree.

 

[tlee618]

This is the tree with the flash on.

 

[tlee618]

Here is a picture of my Dept. 56 Dickens Village

 

[hooverwheelaway]

Yay Terry!

So glad you were able to post some pictures!

Your place looks beautiful; I can't wait to see it!

I'll be looking for a thread on VacuumLand with pictures of you and Robert using all of your vacuums!

~Fred

 

[toggleswitch]

He's right it's absolutely gorgeous!

 

[bendix5]

Your tree is beautiful Terry. Isn't if fun to get out the ornaments every year and remember ones given from friends and family. The ones you forgot you had or bought last year. LOL Mark, I also did a 7" tree in bubble lights one year. I was always looking for the burned out ones too. It was beautiful. I have 6 of the 9 light sets left then several of the noma c7 bubbles.

 

[glamwales]

great trees ! anymore ?

 

[sparkymarky1973]

Hi Neil

I haven't got anymore pics of trees but ill soon be taking pictures of our big walk around santas grotto which is in the garage.

Mark
x

 

[glamwales]

coool i know how fab that is

 

[gansky1]

We got our tree done today - a live Balsam Fir. They are pretty and smell wonderful, but the boughs are rather weak in the lower regions. (the star on top flashes, but is hard to catch with a camera)