| T O P I C R E V I E W |
| Sandy Fields |
Posted - Nov 30 2011 : 06:02:03 AM
I have a fake Christmas tree now... beautiful... but fake. Today on my blog I share a favorite sentiment, and memories of childhood - selecting the perfect blue spruce!
http://field-days.com/bringing-home-the-christmas-tree
How fond to me, the memory of bringing home the Christmas tree.
Love writing about "My Field Days"
www.field-days.com
|
| 12 L A T E S T R E P L I E S (Newest First) |
| ceejay48 |
Posted - Dec 13 2011 : 12:51:53 PM
We used to cut our own . . . wish we could do it again.
Maybe next year . . ??
CJ
..from the barefoot farmgirl in SW Colorado...sister chick #665.
2010 Farmgirl Sister of the Year
Mother Hen: FARMGIRLS SOUTHWEST HENHOUSE
From my Hands - www.cjscreations-ceejay.blogspot.com
the "Purple Thistle" http://www.ceejay48.etsy.com
From my Heart - www.fromacelticheart.blogspot.com
Through my lens - http://ceejayscamera.shutterfly.com/
From my Hubby - www.aspenforge.blogspot.com |
| Sandy Fields |
Posted - Dec 03 2011 : 6:23:48 PM
Suzanne, you are just doing glorious things with your children! What wonderful memories you're making!
I'm heartbroken for the loss of your mother and her Christmas collection. I think the only time I have ever snapped at my father-in-law was one day when he complained a bit about having to get my mother-in-law's "junk" out for Christmas. I announced that there was no such thing as "Christmas junk"!
Have a beautiful Christmas! I visited Rosedown Plantation years and years ago. Oh my! I'd love to see it decorated for Christmas. Enjoy!
Love writing about "My Field Days"
www.field-days.com
|
| SuzanneH |
Posted - Dec 03 2011 : 5:46:23 PM
I love reading about all of your different traditions and experiences.
My mother tried very hard to carry on traditions with me and my siblings with much opposition from my Dad. After she passed he through away all of her years and years of hand made ornaments and hand blown glass ornaments. In fact even the ornaments that us kids made that she had saved. Everything. The attic was cleared out. He just did it and never told a soul. When we went to look for the items to share with our kids, he said there had never been anything in the attic. Oh..he did eventually admitted to doing it. But he wasn't sorry. To him it was worthless junk.
So you move forward....You start new traditions with your own children. My husband and I help our children add to the collection each year. We have over sea friends who often send ornaments. I have found vintage ornaments like my Mom's. Each time I find one like hers I am able to share a new story about my Mom with my children.
We also go every year to the local Christmas Tree Farm where you select and cut your own tree. They have hay ride rides through the tree farm and serve hot cocoa in the barn. They have a great Santa Shop too where the kids can look at wonderful new Christmas Ornaments and candles etc.
The Baton Rouge Symphony comes to Hemingbough every Dec. to play a special Christmas concert. My children look forward to it.
We also take them to Rosedown Plantation to see the decorations and 1800's Christmas dancer's and smore making--my kids love smores but they just seem to taste better when made on the side lawn of an 1800's plantation home.
Christmas Eve is always spent dressed in our very best for a candle light service at church.
My husband and I have made a great effort help our children make their own happy childhood memories.
Suzanne
http://www.etsy.com/shop/countrylifenaturals
http://www.etsy.com/shop/TuttieLou
http://countrynatural.blogspot.com/ |
| Sandy Fields |
Posted - Dec 02 2011 : 6:14:55 PM
Oh Ginny... I loved reading all your traditions. I share the same love of ornaments. We have very large families, and the first year we were married I chose to make an ornament to give everyone. Over the past 3 decades I've cut out hundreds and hundreds of wooden ornaments telling the story of our lives.
My tree is filled with treasures, and I love the stories they tell.
Have a beautiful Christmas!
Love writing about "My Field Days"
www.field-days.com
|
| Oggie |
Posted - Dec 02 2011 : 07:48:41 AM
Living in the Country on as we do, we have gone out back and cut down our own tree and it's brought wonderful memories and traditions for us. My DH over the years has replanted little trees in specific places and groomed them all year so they grow perfect for Christmas trees but we still wander around deciding which tree it will be and it isn't always the one's he's replanted.
With this tradition comes other traditions. I have always made us each an ornament and purchased an ornament that reflects our past year. Now that my daughter is grown, engaged and living 4 hours from us, she has 56+ ornaments for her tree that tell the story of her life growing up. I started doing that because when we married and moved to our home we didn't have any "special" ornaments. I was telling my Mother this one day and how I hated just buying colored balls. A few days later I received an ornament from her of a man and woman on a bicycle built for two to start our lives together with. A light bulb went off and I started this tradition. As we decorate the tree we always talk about our lives by the ornament we are putting up. A Revolutionary Soldier for instance from our trip to Williamsburg; a Witch from our vacation in Salem Mass., a raccoon the year my DH thought he'd feed the birds and instead fed raccoons but not by choice. A car when my DD learned to drive, a Girl Scout Brownie when she started Girl Scouts, that sort of thing. It's a great time to reflect on your life and be thankful for what you have.
While doing this we always have cookies and eggnog and after the tree top goes up, I hand out the new ornaments and we put them on the tree, turn off the lights, and sit and look at it's beauty for the evening.
But now that she is grown my DH and I bit the bullet and bought an artificial tree for this year as we are getting older and it's getting harder, especially since he had foot surgery this year and can't walk on uneven ground. So much for hiking in the woods! But we will still do the rest of the traditions even if it's the two of us and I'm lucky in that this year I now get to start making ornaments for a future SIL!
Ginny
Farmgirl #2343
www.thedewhopinn.com
www.etsy.com/shop/cybertiques
"I always have a wonderful time, wherever I am, whomever I'm with."
"Well, I've wrestled with reality for 35 years, Doctor, and I'm happy to state I finally won out over it." Both by Elwood P. Dowd (Jimmy Stewart) in the Movie Harvey
|
| Sandy Fields |
Posted - Dec 01 2011 : 07:05:57 AM
Annika and Jess.. loved hearing from both of you!
When I see "Moscow, Idaho" in print, I'm so happy. I was only there once - just had to drive through and see it. My grandmother lived there for a year or two when she was a tiny girl. She would tell of her parents ice-skating beautifully on a pond. And I know what you mean about knowing "your tree" the minute you see it!
Jess, just reading the words of your girls giggling while "bringing home the Christmas tree" was music to my ears.
Oh! I love Christmas trees!!
Love writing about "My Field Days"
www.field-days.com
|
| jessabelluh |
Posted - Nov 30 2011 : 6:09:43 PM
I like the lights for the first week idea, we left it lights only for just a day. But there is something beautiful and pure about a simply lit tree, and ours has green lights which is nice!
Since being married, I have only had artificial trees, and I do mean trees, we never have just one tree up.
This year we decided to go out and cut down a tree. We got a great deal, a 7 1/2 foot tree for $8, plus we paid $1 to have it bound. We had a great time trekking though the tree farm, the girls were holding hands and giggling because of all of the picky vines that were attacking them, which made them trail behind. It was nice to see and hear them having fun like that (they're both teens) it made my husband and I laugh as well. The tree is way wider than we usually have and I'm just loving it. Great memories were made and before we even left the farm everyone decided that we will do the same next year.
I say it's like having another pet though, as I feel like I'm always tending to or watering it ;)
~jess |
| Annika |
Posted - Nov 30 2011 : 5:54:30 PM
We always go to our favorite charity lot and pick out a tree each year. They know us, it's a smallish town here, and I always bring cookies and fudge  We've thought of going and cutting down our own, but I'd miss the yearly ritual and the exchange of happy wishes and most of all the kids oogly eyes over the goodies that I bring 
I think it's going to be a fir this year, or one of the long needled pines...But we always know "Our tree" when we see it!
Annika
Farmgirl & sister #13
http://thegimpyfarmgirl.blogspot.com/
http://pinterest.com/annikaloveshats/
Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication. ~Leonardo DaVinci
|
| Sandy Fields |
Posted - Nov 30 2011 : 5:21:17 PM
Emily! I love how you let everyone have their little bit of tradition! Lights for the first week... that's wonderful.
I'm sure it smells heavenly too!
Love writing about "My Field Days"
www.field-days.com
|
| Simply Satisfied |
Posted - Nov 30 2011 : 1:54:38 PM
This year we found my husband and I actually like different trees. While out looking for our tree in the woods with our two little ones we discovered I like spruce and he likes fir. Well being that my daughter's (4 and 2) seem to vote my way I got the tree I liked. It looks great. My husband put it up then due to the pokey nature of spruce he decided I should out the lights up. I put the lights up yesterday. It looks great and the kids love it. My husband really likes the tree with just lights so every year after the lights go up we leave the decorations off for a week or so for us to enjoy the simplicity of the lights. I love that the whole process has us all involved and how we try to keep everyone's wishes in mind.
Emily
Farmgirl # 3591 |
| Sandy Fields |
Posted - Nov 30 2011 : 07:42:14 AM
You said it all.. new memories, old memories.. indeed.. no better time than Christmas! Have fun finding the perfect tree!!
Love writing about "My Field Days"
www.field-days.com
|
| Heartbroken farmgirl |
Posted - Nov 30 2011 : 06:54:46 AM
We are trying a first this year. We've always gone to a lot or farmers market and bought a precut tree. On Saturday, myself and all 5 kids are going to cut down our tree. We are meeting my sister and her boyfriend, who are also cutting their first tree. New memories, old memories...is there any better time than Christmas??
The tears I shed then, watered the flowers I harvest now.
www.broken908.blogspot.com
http://forums.familyfriendpoems.com/broken908
"The aim of education is the knowledge not of facts but of values."-Dean William Ralph Inge |
