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General => The Common Room => The Lighter Side => Topic started by: Treetotal on Wednesday 18 December 19 14:13 GMT (UK)
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Christmas is a time for nostalgia and always brings back memories of the Christmas Cards that I made for my family and friends which sadly were never kept. All I ever asked for at Christmas time was a "A Tin of Paints and a drawing book" which gave me the most pleasure of all the gifts, not that there were many with four of us to buy for.
I always decorated the mirror using flour and water and paints to write a greeting, add holly, a snowman and snow. I also created a scene around the bottom of the artificial Christmas with a log base, using cotton wool for snow, a handbag mirror for the pond and various Christmas cake decorations and items saved from previous years etc, skating figures, sledges, postbox, cats and robins...finished off with a sprinkling of glitter. I also made tree decorations from old Christmas cards and coloured tin foil saved from sweet wrappers.
As environmental issues together with Social Media have impacted on the sending of Christmas cards as awareness of the destruction of Rain Forests grows, i believe that the Christmas card will very soon become a thing of the past, sad, but necessary in the current climate :-\
I have started to look for and buy old Christmas cards which are a delight. The artwork and designs of Christmas cards have changed so much over the years and I much prefer the old ones.
I hope you enjoy the ones attached...The postcard is dated 1904
Carol
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Three more :D :D
Carol
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I got very nostalgic reading your post Carol. How very true about the style of greeting cards. This year I decided to surf the net with the aim of buying a box of "ye olde" style Christmas Cards. I would have preferred 3-D although it wasn't such a priority, but I didn't see anything suitable and in the end bought from my local shop.
My favourite present as a child was receiving a type of dictionary in the form of a large paint box which had several shades of each colour,. e.g.not just"red" but, peuce, vermillion, scarlet, etc. I think I probably chose my favourite colour of turquoise from that box.
I was a bit out of step with the fashion when our youngest child first attended school. For his first Christmas when he needed to exchange cards with his pals I'd bought a large scrap book with various coloured cardboard pages. Son and I used the coloured pages for small-ish home made Xmas cards, e.g. shape of green Christmas tree with stuck on decorations on red card. It soon became apparent that son was the only child to make cards and even more surprising was that he received daily orders from other children for him to make them a card too. :)
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Thanks for sharing Rena...your paints must have been more like artist's colours...mine were more like this:
https://www.rubylane.com/item/183041-47-0357/Alice-Wonderland-1950s-Vintage-Page-London
I won a a Christmas Card competition for painting a Christmas Card at school when I was about 8 or 9..it was a lit candle with holly decoration, my prize was a Mars Bar. I took it home and cut it into four to share with my Brothers and Sister, I left my piece in the wrapper on the chair arm to visit the toilet and when I came back, the dog was under the table licking it's lips and my share of the chocolate was gone :-\ ;D ;D
My Mother bought me another one the next day and said that I could eat it all :D
Carol
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Impressive little collection.
They don't make 'em like that anymore! :'(
Did anyone notice the date on the Doll's Bath postcard? ::) ;D I'll bet it was delivered before Crhistmas day too. :D
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I have others along with New Year and Birthdays one.Yes I noticed, not like today's postal service :-\ ;D ;D
Carol
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Not so far past but does anyone remember the real candles in their little holders that clipped onto the christmas tree branches that were then lit and s the tree was covered in real flames!
Health and Safety would have a fit these days!
Pheno
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Carol the cards are so beautiful , thanks for posting them.
I have some that were sent to my family members they are my most treasured items.
As for your Mars Bar ;D ;D
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Not so far past but does anyone remember the real candles in their little holders that clipped onto the christmas tree branches that were then lit and s the tree was covered in real flames!
Health and Safety would have a fit these days!
Pheno
Oh yes! You had to make sure there was not a branch above the candles.
After tea in on Christmas Day we were allowed to have them burning for a few minutes then Dad ( So Brave) would wet his thumb and forefinger and pinch them out .
Such simple things gave us much pleasure, we were so lucky.
I did not own a watch until I was married ,O.H, got it for my 20 th Birthday .
I always asked Mum for one but never got one.
Still have it!
However did we eat lunch at one o ‘ clock then tea at five!
Mind you- portions were smaller and not such variety but it was always delicious.
Don’t seem able to reproduce it as Mum made it.
Here is a little verse from an old card which had been used as a bookmark in a book I bought from an antiquarian bookshop.
“ Like the ivy thoughts entwine,
Around true friends at Christmas time.”
Decorated with sprigs of ivy of course.
Around 1900’s I’d say.
Thanks for the memories.
Viktoria.
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Not so far past but does anyone remember the real candles in their little holders that clipped onto the christmas tree branches that were then lit and s the tree was covered in real flames!
Health and Safety would have a fit these days!
Pheno
I don't remember having those, the ones we had with candles were plug in ones...then we had the multi coloured lanterns.
Carol
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Carol the cards are so beautiful , thanks for posting them.
I have some that were sent to my family members they are my most treasured items.
As for your Mars Bar ;D ;D
Aw...that is so special..I wish I had family ones...the oldest one I have is OH's 21st Birthday card from her Husband in the 1940s.
Carol
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I love the rhyme Victoria...thanks for sharing...I got my first watch when I was 15 years old and treasured it, until my Brother stood on it :'(
He bought me another, a Timex, when he started work but it wasn't the same :-\
Carol
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I love the rhyme Victoria...thanks for sharing...I got my fist watch when I was 15 years old and treasured it, until my Brother stood on it :'(
He bought me another, a Timex, when he started work but it wasn't the same :-\
Carol
Well, I'll be! I also got a watch from my parents on my fifteenth birthday . . . a Timex! It lasted for many years, surviving several dunkings in the R. Trent. The winder eventually wore out and no one could replace it. I tried electronic ones but they never lasted, so I haven't worn a watch for something like 40yrs now.
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It was bought three weeks before our first baby was born and how O.H afforded it I do not know as we had bought pram,cot, layette etc.
Probably cut down drastically on the Senior Service.
So it means such a lot to me.
In a box with explanation as I am an emotional coward and can’t part with it even though when it was 15 years old my six year old daughter helped by winding it for me. :'(
It died.
Cheerio folks, have a lovely time .
Viktoria.
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One day, Viktoria, I will compile all your comments into a book of wisdom.
Martin
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One day, Viktoria, I will compile all your comments into a book of wisdom.
Martin
And it will be jolly worthwhile reading, Martin. :)
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I love the rhyme Victoria...thanks for sharing...I got my fist watch when I was 15 years old and treasured it, until my Brother stood on it :'(
He bought me another, a Timex, when he started work but it wasn't the same :-\
Carol
Well, I'll be! I also got a watch from my parents on my fifteenth birthday . . . a Timex! It lasted for many years, surviving several dunkings in the R. Trent. The winder eventually wore out and no one could replace it. I tried electronic ones but they never lasted, so I haven't worn a watch for something like 40yrs now.
I think most of us in that era had a first watch not a fist watch that was a Timex.
Carol
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One day, Viktoria, I will compile all your comments into a book of wisdom.
Martin
Shouldn’t think it will be a fat volume Mart, I do daft things these days like having to go through the paper recycling bin as I had kept an empty envelope and disposed of one with things I wanted to save!
I am worrying now if I put a cross or a tick on my ballot paper ! ;D
Viktoria.
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One day, Viktoria, I will compile all your comments into a book of wisdom.
Martin
Shouldn’t think it will be a fat volume Mart, I do daft things these days like having to go through the paper recycling bin as I had kept an empty envelope and disposed of one with things I wanted to save!
I am worrying now if I put a cross or a tick on my ballot paper ! ;D
Viktoria.
Don't underestimate yourself, Viktoria, I think many people here enjoy your stories ;)
And I think either a tick or a cross would work ;) ;) ;)
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As this is a thread about Christmas Past, I thought I'd share this. I've posted it elsewhere but thought it fitted perfectly here. My Great uncle Bob, my grandmother's youngest brother enlisted when he was 17 and was in France by 1915. He was wounded twice and taken POW in 1918. Luckily he survived and lived into his 80s.
This card is one he sent my grandmother in 1916 it has written on the back in pencil, " "Wishing you a peaceful Christmas, love Bob. Dec 1916"
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What a super card Jan. I have several in a similar style but I've just checked them and none of them are Christmas Cards.
Carol, thanks for showing us some of your fascinating cards :)
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As this is a thread about Christmas Past, I thought I'd share this. I've posted it elsewhere but thought it fitted perfectly here. My Great uncle Bob, my grandmother's youngest brother enlisted when he was 17 and was in France by 1915. He was wounded twice and taken POW in 1918. Luckily he survived and lived into his 80s.
This card is one he sent my grandmother in 1916 it has written on the back in pencil, " "Wishing you a peaceful Christmas, love Bob. Dec 1916"
How lovely, it must have been a thrill for your Grandmother to receive it :D
Thanks for sharing 8)
Carol
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What a super card Jan. I have several in a similar style but I've just checked them and none of them are Christmas Cards.
Carol, thanks for showing us some of your fascinating cards :)
How lovely Jen...post them anyway, I would love to see them and i'm sure others would ;)
Carol
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How lovely Jen...post them anyway, I would love to see them and i'm sure others would ;)
This one is rather nice - it's actually in the form of a little envelope containing a card.
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Jen they are beautiful , I'm so pleased you posted them, thank you.
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I've just noticed that the one groom posted is actually an envelope containing a little card.
Here's the only other 'envelope' one I've got, I've scanned the card as well.
There are some more which I can do tomorrow if anyone would like to see them, but (as with the two I've just posted they aren't actually on Carol's topic of Christmas Cards.
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Absolutely gorgeous Jen , I would love to see the others too please. I love this type of cards :)
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Here's a couple more. I do have more but I think I'd better stop now as I am digressing from Carol's topic.
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Aren't they lovely...I love the ones withe the pocket and card, are any of them from Family Jen? I have a huge old postcard collection but no silk or embroidered ones.
Carol
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Thank you Jen they are beautiful. I wish I had some.
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They were all passed down from my grandmother, but sadly I have no idea who sent them.
I can't resist posting the last two.
The second one is made from cut-out paper. There are three separate sections - the centre containing the words, the small area surrounding it, and the outer, more elaborate, surround. Each of these three components are mounted on paper 'hinges' of differing length (the longest on the outer section well over an inch long less than an inch long on the innermost section) so that when they are all extended you are looking through two frames into the message set deep in the centre (very difficult to describe ::) )
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The attached Christmas card was sent to my Mum by my Dad who was stationed in Palestine (with the RAF) in WW2 - there is no date on the card. My parents were married on 7 Oct 1944 and Mum said that he was recalled shortly after that - they were actually on their honeymoon when the orders came.
When the card is closed, the Air Force symbol shows thru the cutout on the front. I'm a scrapbooker, so the card is safely kept in one of my family albums.
Ms_C
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File was too large, so here is the other side of the card in my previous message.
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How lovely....you are lucky to have them. Thanks for sharing...I was hoping that someone else would share their old cards :D
Carol
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I have a collection of greetings cards which were saved by my great aunt in the early years of the 20th cent. They are mostly Christmas cards, though many are not what we would call "Christmassy". Also, they are all quite small. The one pictured has fascinated me since I first saw it. It opens out, though not far - hence my hand holding it. I am surprised it came out so well, as I was holding the camera with one hand! (Swallows were a favourite motif.)
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Wow...love that one...they don't make them like that anymore...thanks for sharing.
Carol
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I thought this post from last year was worth revisiting as there are so many lovely old cards on here. Maybe others have some to share. 8)
Enjoy :D
Carol
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Viktoria, to hark back about your comment on old watches, there's a chap - Jeweller near Rochdale Market, not far from you, - who quite probably would be able to put a new movement into your old, nostalgic watch, and not at a huge cost. He did it for someone I know.
TY
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Oh thank you, that is kind.
The next time I am at R/ Dale Hospital my son will take me to look where the shop is and then when travel is easier I can see if it can be done.
Aren’t I a sentimental old noo nah !
Viktoria.
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Can't easily get you the name something like "JR Jewellers", right by the old covered market.
Seems to be a really good chap, he said if he couldn't do things, very honest.
I'd have that done myself, nostalgia IS what it used to be!
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I'd forgotten about Christmas cards.
Here's one from 1911 from my granddad to his parents
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I'd forgotten about Christmas cards.
Here's one from 1911 from my granddad to his parents
That's really lovely Griff, you are very lucky to have it 8) Thanks for sharing.
Carol
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I'd forgotten about Christmas cards.
Here's one from 1911 from my granddad to his parents
That's really lovely Griff, you are very lucky to have it 8) Thanks for sharing.
Carol
Thank you Carol, yes, extremely lucky to have been given lots of post cards, Christmas and birthday cards, as well as photos from the very early 1900's and through the 1st WW.
Most people would have thrown them away but they're little treasures of family life from that period.
Griff
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I wish there was a Green Emoji as I am very envious and you obviously value them ;)
Carol
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I wish there was a Green Emoji as I am very envious an you obviously value them ;)
Carol
😆 I do indeed Carol. Things family members have touched, written, reading their thoughts, their adventures.
Not just old stuff but letters from my niece to my parents about uni life, my younger brother's adventures travelling through India in the late 90's,
An aunt who became ill, every letter she wrote me, her hand became more shakey. Anything I can find, I keep for the future owner of the 100's of hours research I've done.
Griff
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Good on you, your family will thanks you for, what a great archive of social history 8)
Carol
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Can't easily get you the name something like "JR Jewellers", right by the old covered market.
Seems to be a really good chap, he said if he couldn't do things, very honest.
I'd have that done myself, nostalgia IS what it used to be!
No problem ,whilst I am in the hospital my son often goes walkabout ,last time he went to see the dinosaur skeleton cast which is now marooned in R/Dale through Covid 19
I tidied up my posts and can’t find the relevant one ,is it the one my daughter, thinking she was being helpful wound up .?
My OH bought it for me ,I had never had a watch before.
I was expecting my first baby.
I would love to get it repaired.
Aren’t the cards lovely , I don’t know how to post photographs or I would send pics of one or two I have, the Christmas ones are not particularly
Christmassy ,Roses etc.
One has the verse:- “ Like the Ivy
Thoughts entwine
Around true friends
At Christmas time.”
Cheerio ,Viktoria.
Good on you, your family will thanks you for, what a great archive of social history 8)
Carol
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Can't easily get you the name something like "JR Jewellers", right by the old covered market.
Seems to be a really good chap, he said if he couldn't do things, very honest.
I'd have that done myself, nostalgia IS what it used to be!
Is it JLR Jewellers?
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Thanks Gadget, son will look no doubt ,have another appt in the not too distant future.
Viktoria.
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I love the rhyme Victoria...thanks for sharing...I got my fist watch when I was 15 years old and treasured it, until my Brother stood on it :'(
He bought me another, a Timex, when he started work but it wasn't the same :-\
Carol
Well, I'll be! I also got a watch from my parents on my fifteenth birthday . . . a Timex! It lasted for many years, surviving several dunkings in the R. Trent. The winder eventually wore out and no one could replace it. I tried electronic ones but they never lasted, so I haven't worn a watch for something like 40yrs now.
I think most of us in that era had a first watch not a fist watch that was a Timex.
Carol
Mine was a Sekonda, a combined birthday and Christmas present. Birthday is July. It might have been Christmas + 2 birthdays. I think it cost £6 which would have been average present cost x3. Main function of the watch was timing of exams in O-Level year.
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How lovely Jen...post them anyway, I would love to see them and i'm sure others would ;)
This one is rather nice - it's actually in the form of a little envelope containing a card.
I didn't have one of those little envelope postcards when I posted this Jen, I now have two and thought of you when I bought them, cheap a £1 each.
Carol
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A couple more.
Carol
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Another from 1911, a bit posh having their name etc printed inside :P
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Oh very up market :D :D I have a couple that are dated and with the name and address printed inside. One is from a Doctor and the other has a monogram on the front. Sadly, not family ones though, just part of my collection.
Carol
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Oh very up market :D :D I have a couple that are dated and with the name and address printed inside. One is from a Doctor and the other has a monogram on the front. Sadly, not family ones though, just part of my collection.
Carol
Isn't it sad that these things get parted from families.
I've got a big collection of "in memoriam" cards which are sold on a well known auction site. One lot I bought for virtually nothing, about 60 cards, were all related to each other in some way, mostly by marriage etc and relating to an area of Dorset. I feel that I've "rescued" them from being split up and sold on individually.
When a distant relative of mine sold items relating to my 2x gt granddad via an auction house, I missed it by a week, I'd have paid anything to own it, I'm still kicking myself 3 years later
Griff
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Like these from my collection. I made attempts to find family but no joy.
Carol
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...and Mary. Its sad when you think Family would treasure these if they only knew they existed.
Carol
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Viktoria, I'd intended to make an expedition over to Lancashire to pop in to Rochdale to say "hello" to Dippy, poor thing, exiled from his home to be a wanderer - but I'd assumed he wasn't open to visitors, or would have moved on by now?
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One more. Maybe someone will see these and claim them.
Carol
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Like these from my collection. I made attempts to find family but no joy.
Carol
Yes! I've a few relating to my family and I treasure them.
I'd gladly give the ones that aren't my family to the rightful owners.
I've a collection of hand written documents/letters relating to a heroic deed by a young man in Staffordshire, late 1800's too, he and 3 of his friends walked onto a frozen lake, 3 fell through the ice, he saved 2 but the third drowned, a collection was made by local businessmen and he was presented with a silver, inscribed pocket watch for his heroism. (I wonder where that is now?) one day I'll find the rightful owner of the letters etc. . It's very moving stuff.
Griff
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Here's a very different Christmas Greeting.
This is a 1943 'airgraph' Christmas letter sent to my father who was serving in the Middle East, by his younger brother. Quite how he imagined my father was going to have a 'prosperous' New Year I don't know, but the thought was there.
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Like these from my collection. I made attempts to find family but no joy.
Carol
Yes! I've a few relating to my family and I treasure them.
I'd gladly give the ones that aren't my family to the rightful owners.
I've a collection of hand written documents/letters relating to a heroic deed by a young man in Staffordshire, late 1800's too, he and 3 of his friends walked onto a frozen lake, 3 fell through the ice, he saved 2 but the third drowned, a collection was made by local businessmen and he was presented with a silver, inscribed pocket watch for his heroism. (I wonder where that is now?) one day I'll find the rightful owner of the letters etc. . It's very moving stuff.
Griff
Wow...how lucky you are to have such a treasure trove of Family documents. There is so many unclaimed artefacts out there :-\
Carol
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Here's a very different Christmas Greeting.
This is a 1943 'airgraph' Christmas letter sent to my father who was serving in the Middle East, by his younger brother. Quite how he imagined my father was going to have a 'prosperous' New Year I don't know, but the thought was there.
Oh that's amazing...how lucky that you are to have it and that it survived. Thanks for sharing Jen 8)
Carol
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Like these from my collection. I made attempts to find family but no joy.
Carol
Yes! I've a few relating to my family and I treasure them.
I'd gladly give the ones that aren't my family to the rightful owners.
I've a collection of hand written documents/letters relating to a heroic deed by a young man in Staffordshire, late 1800's too, he and 3 of his friends walked onto a frozen lake, 3 fell through the ice, he saved 2 but the third drowned, a collection was made by local businessmen and he was presented with a silver, inscribed pocket watch for his heroism. (I wonder where that is now?) one day I'll find the rightful owner of the letters etc. . It's very moving stuff.
Griff
Wow...how lucky you are to have such a treasure trove of Family documents. There is so many unclaimed artefacts out there :-\
Carol
I love ephemera. Through perseverance I've found some pretty interesting docs relating to my ancestors, mostly court summonses 😂 but one or two that helped me move on with research, also, lots that helped me understand what life was really like where they lived in the 1800's, it was pretty grim!