D is for decorations

 

I rather envy those of you who have decorations which your children made when they were young and which you now show to your grandchildren.  The decorations I put up are largely homemade but by me.  There is such vitality in things made by children.

When I was a little girl we lived in quite a large house with a staircase which turned twice so the Christmas tree stood in the stairwell and even little people could reach through and put decoration on the upper branches.  

First to go on were the fairy lights.  Every summer the lights would lose their plug as it was needed for something else so at Christmas another lightly used electrical appliance would lose its plug.  Even when that went on, the lights never worked first time and Daddy had to check every bulb before the set could be put on the tree.   Inevitably they needed another sort-out once they'd been put in place.  

And then the fairy herself could go on the tree.  As the youngest I was always allowed to do this.  She was an incredibly tatty fairy, probably a pre-war jobby, but for me she was magic.  Then tinsel, saved every year until it was nearly bald.  The baubles in those far off days were always blown glass, so pretty but so fragile.  Finally, lametta and maybe some cotton wool for the gaps.  

The other decorations are not so clear in my memory.  Mummy always fetched in lots of greenery, some of which was sprayed gold or silver.  She had some logs of wood which her brother had drilled to form candle holders and he'd made smaller holes so sprigs of holly could be added and arranged.  

The decorations never went up before the twentieth of the month, except for cards which were pinned to vertical streamers attached to the picture rail around each room.  My parents received a lot of cards and leaving them so late would have made for a long and tedious job.  

Memories of a secure and loving childhood.