Some more '25 Days of Christmas Project'...

Thank you for all the lovely comments on the post I wrote about the first week of this project. So, to continue...

Day 8

This collage is made up of photos of Christmas trees that I saw all on one day earlier in December. The larger photo shows a big pile of real trees that had obviously been delivered to this suburban shop earlier. The staff were gradually moving the trees into the side yard of the shop. The smell of the pine trees was wonderful!  The smaller tree at the top right was a tree made of wooden fence palings in the foyer of a big hardware store. The decorations were store gift cards 😊. The other tree was a little artificial tree on the table at the Holland Park hotel where a group of us lunched to celebrate the coming of Christmas. 😉

Day 9

Found in a box of old photos was this treasure! It's a handmade pop-up card made by DD2 for her dad and I. Vintage would be mid 1990s.

Day 10

I was surprised by how much the Day 10 photo stirred up memories of childhood for others. I'd actually been a bit reticent about posting it, but I'm glad I did. When I was about 9 I really wanted a Christmas tree at home, but my parents weren't too keen on the idea. Probably it didn't fit the family budget. I'm guessing that those families who did have a tree had 'real' ones as I don't remember artificial ones around in the 1950s. 

So...not to be thwarted in my attempts to have a Christmas tree, I hacked a branch off the acalypha hedge that served as our front fence and put it in one of the old metal buckets that were kept in the laundry. Memory fades but I reckon the tree decorations would have been paper chains. 

The other photos in the collage are the artificial trees I bought over the years in my adulthood. 

Day 11

Driving through a number of suburbs one morning recently I realised it was the last day of the school year before the long Christmas holidays. That made me think of the staff breakfasts that we used to have on those days...arriving early at school about 7am, all staff ( teaching, ancillary,  admin, grounds, cleaners,) would sit down for breakfast ( and Christmas food treats) until 9. So the day 11 photo is of my last staff breakfast before I retired.

Day 12

DD1 and DD2 are holding the Christmas cakes that my friend helped them ice and decorate. They did a great job and had lots of fun. I'd say this photo dates back to the late 1980s.

Day 13

These were photos taken last Saturday night when DH and I went out with my brother and sister in law  to the Carols Night of the Underground Opera Company. http://www.undergroundopera.com.au/our-concerts/opera-in-the-reservoir/

The venue is the old reservoir in Spring Hill. It was built in the 1800s and was the original water storage supply for Brisbane of that time. It was decommissioned in the 1960s and sat derelict until it was eventually restored and opened to the public for various 'cultural occasions'. The building is 6 metres underground and the beautiful brick arches allow for wonderful acoustics. It's really fascinating to be sitting on what would have been the bottom of a giant 'water tank'. 

Day 14

And it was time to post another photo from the family archives...this time, from DH's family. Christmas 1981 at his parents' house...

All those children in the photos are in their 40s now. My sister in law Sonja is the lady with the pink top and DH's mum is in the lower left photo. Such memories; the little house is gone now, replaced by two large homes of two storeys. 

So only 11 more days of photos to go for 2016! 

The Christmas Tree...

Apparently Queen Victoria's husband Prince Albert, introduced the concept of the Christmas tree to the UK during his wife's reign and from there it possibly reached to all corners of the old British Commonwealth.  The tree had been a tradition in his German homeland for many years. As a child I always wanted a Christmas tree but I had to grow up and go to work before I achieved that dream. I've had a few trees since then, admittedly all artificial. But the tree is such a symbol of Christmas isn't it? 

Earlier in the month I went to some craft markets at a local Baptist Church, and sure enough there were some trees just inside the front door...

And yesterday I took a photo of the Christmas tree in one of the churches in our parish...

During Advent parishioners are bringing in donations of non perishable food and these are put under the tree. There are cardboard baubles which are placed on the tree when people donate cash too. The stuffed animal toys are leftover from the Nativity service for the Mainly Music children last week.

Now that brings me to my place and my tree. DH set the tree up last week but it stood undecorated...very sad! Lol. 

Then DD1 and her boyfriend came to lunch yesterday and after lunch the two of them helped me get the Christmas 'stuff' out of the various cupboards where they are stored...

And once they got all the boxes down from the high cupboards, it took the two of them about 20 minutes to get that tree decorated...

All done! And I think they had fun doing it too...always a bonus!