Let the Festivities Begin!

Hello everyone!!  It is officially the start of the festive season yayyyyy!  I love this time of year.  For once people seem to be nicer to eachother and everyone seems a little happier than usual.  It love the snow (although this year it could be problematic as I have a business that relys on the post), and I especially love all the food and drink that is around.  As I love this time of year so much I thought I would let you in on a few of my Christmas traditions, as to me Christmas is all about those family traditions.

It is left to me every year in the Blue's household to decorate the Christmas tree.  It is partly because others are too lazy saying that I am the "arty one" in the family, and it is partly because I am the only one who gets so excited by Christmas :).  So today I put up my Traditional Christmas Tree.

In my family we have never had a real Christmas tree.  A lot of people choose real trees as they have a certain smell of Christmas and for them it is probably their family tradition.  Well in my family our tradition is to use our much loved plastic tree.  We recently bought a new one and it is very impressive.  This is because for about 20 years we used the same plastic tree we always had, and it became very threadbare, motheaten and sparse until we really had to get a new one!  The old one had a lovely little story behind it; my Mum bought it in Miami (of all places) when she was a Trolly Dolly for British Airways.  So it reminded her of the good the old days, and in turn reminded us all of Christmas' past.  But alas it died and we now have a very big, full looking tree compared to the old one!  So to start I assembled the tree and teased out all the branches to make it look like a real tree.

I always like to put our tree in a corner against a wall or two.  This way you don't have to decorate the whole thing - I have a short attention span.  We have a lot of furniture in our living room at the moment so it has been shoved behind a sofa this year, so there is even less of the tree I have to decorate WHOOP!

The first step is to check the lights work BEFORE you put it on the tree.  Luckily they worked first time, they didn't last year!  So I wound the lights starting from the top and working all the way down to the bottom.  I then alternated tinsel of red and gold down the tree, and popped the fairy on top who each year looks a little drunk as she tends to lean to one side ever so slightly.  And then the fun can begin!  The decorations.

As with the tree, each decoration has its own story behind it and they are lovingly used every year.  Each year we add one or two new ones to the collection to replace any old knackered ones or broken ones.  Some are broken and used again each year because they are just too special and sentimental to get rid of!  I have taken a few close up of some of my favourite old decorations.

This is one of those old broken ones that is too special to get rid of.  It is made of half an egg shell that has been painted and embellished and filled with a little nativity scene.  I love it as it reminds me of the hidden treasures of a Faberge egg.  The outside which you can't see is painted and has a gorgeously Christmassy red velvet ribbon trim.  What is so lovely about it, is I have never seen anything like it in the shops nowadays, so it feels even more special.

This decoration is SO cute.  It is a tiny little book with Christmas Carols in!!  The carols are written in sheet music as well as having the lyrics, and I can remember singing my heart out when I was little reading from this little book.  I didn't attempt to sing this year, I get complaints from my dogs :)

This one I made at nursery school when I was 3 years old.  It has a little bit of tinsel in it and some jingle bells, all encased in a little pouch with a ribbon and button drawstring.

In this photo is a sausage dog decoration that my friend Alice gave to me (she also came to Goodwood with me).  Anyone who knows me, knows that I am obsessed with my little sausage dogs, Frank and Tess.  I am also a big fan of novelty sausage dog items, so this was the perfect present :).  There is also a motheaten fairy charm just above and to the left of the sausage, which is broken, which was bought from Salcombe, Devon on a holiday when I was a little girl.  To the right of that and above is a much loved snowman in a box decoration.  His eye is missing but he is much loved!

This piccy has my beloved egg decoration and to the left and just below is a new decoration that I bought at a garden centre near Bournemouth when I was visiting my sister yesterday.  The garden centre had an AMAZING Christmas display, and for those of you who follow me on twitter you may have seen the pic I tweeted of an amazing Hollywood Cinema Christmas display.  Well this is where that decoration came from, so I thought I would buy it to add to the collection this year a little slice of Hollywood sparkle.  I could go on and on about all the decorations in this picture as each one has a special memory and little story attached to it.  But I won't bore you.  All that is left is for you to see the finished result.

I have to say it looks more impressive in person!  The photographs don't do it justice.  But having said that, our Christmas tree isn't about being trendy, neat, matching or themed, it is about the special memories and sentiment that this time of year brings to us.  And it's tradition!

I hope you are having fun putting up your tree and not getting the festive grump some people do!

Lots of Love
Betty xxxxxxxx

P.S.  I put antlers on one of my dogs :D made me laugh so much!!



No animals were hurt in the making of this blog - promise :)