Christmas's Past

This image was emailed to me and I liked the colors and feel of vintage Christmas. Our roads and walkways look very snowy right now, much like this picture. I have been thinking of Christmas in the old days, and will be posting several photos from Christmas's we have experienced in our lives.

This is a photo of me on Christmas morning, 1952. This was the year I got my first doll, and received another doll each Christmas for many years. She came complete with a doll buggy (we didn't call them strollers back then.) That was an exceptionally large tricycle, and I rode it until I was past 5 years old. They don't make 'em like that anymore....The tree looks mighty skimpy and I have no idea where my parents got it. We lived in Seattle, they were poor etc. But the decorations are beautiful, and many are still hanging on my tree today, labeled 'great vintage ornaments'. The days of real tinsel made a tree so lovely...and my Mom hung each piece individually. What patience!

This is Christmas morning a year later. We added a home-made doll, a doll bed my Uncle Harold made and a mattress, mattress pad, pillow, pillowcase and quilt my Aunt Nuna made. That is my first stocking hanging from the miniature ironing board (I guess little girls liked to pretend to iron then along with their mommies). It came complete with a bitty iron. I still have the stocking, but it is threadbare these days. One big difference it shows up is how small and skinny it is. You can't get very much into that stocking, and that's the way it was back then. You just got a couple of items, and maybe an orange. Now days it's the bigger the better....and stockings are huge. I also received that small stove with teapot and coffeepot...I remember hours of fun with that. I sure look pleased with my new bathrobe don't I?

One thing that the pictures don't show is the creche my Mom always put up. I still have it as well, and it is just a very thin stable with glued on animals, Joseph, Mary and baby Jesus. The bottom says Woolworth...and 'made in Japan'. It may not have been of much worth monetarily, but my parents always showed my brother and I the true meaning of Christmas. The presents shown in the photos were fun, and I'm sure my parents had great fun giving them to me as I was their only child in these years. But they gave me something of infinite worth when they gave me the knowledge of how much God loved me, and how God sent His son...I accepted Jesus as my Savior when I was 4 (a year later than these photos) with my Mom in my bedroom. A remarkable calling of God upon my life...the best present I have ever received.