Tuesday, December 24, 2019

The Holiday Decoration You Love to Hate

DEBORAH CROMBIE: We’ve all been given some odd things over  the years, right? There is that moment when you think (but don’t say), “Gosh, what on earth am I going to do with this?” This happened to me a few years ago when my hubby brought home a gift from a friend and business client. It was a little LED wire tree, and it... blinked. I don’t like things that blink. But he was tickled, so we plugged it in on our kitchen counter.

Well, it grew on me, that little tree. I straightened its branches, and the more I looked at it, the more cheerful I found it. Now, it’s one of the first things we put out every year, and I’m always a little sad to see it go back into the storage box. I guess it’s our Charlie Brown tree.



(The lights are actually bright red and green, but LEDs photograph weirdly.)

REDS, have you grown to love things you would never have chosen?

JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: Can I talk about the decoration I DIDN’T grow to love? So, Ross in his childhood had had a contraption called “Santa’s Band” on the mantlepiece. Santa leading a whole line of marching band musicians in cheery red coats. You plugged it in and they played Christmas songs. Enchanting, right? That’s what I thought the day he, overjoyed at his good luck in finding his childhood decorating must-have, came home with santa’s band.

Dutifully, I strung Santa and the musicians atop our mantel, removing my own very tasteful display of candles twined with white fairy lights. But the Santa Band contraption looked cute enough, after I spent a half hour hiding (and eventually taping down) the multiple twisting green wires that powered it. Then we turned it on.

OMG. The cacophony. The Santa Band played at the same decibel level of jackhammers in NYC, every note high-pitched and tinny. I had to retreat to the kitchen while Ross sat in his chair beside the fireplace, happily bobbing his head to the so-called “music.” But then--

Oh no! Turns out the band members vibrate as they play! They jiggled themselves to the edge of the mantle and began to leap to their deaths, prevented from disaster only because they were all linked together with the wires I had painstakingly hidden, and which were now sagging across the lip of the mantle. It looked like a troop of identically dressed hikers carrying instruments had fallen off an alpine cliff, all roped together.


As the engineering sort of the family (really!) I was called on to fix the problem. The Santa Band members needed to be individually duct-taped into position, and THEN the wires could be hidden and taped down. A task I performed year after year after year - and then made myself scarce whenever Ross turned on the music. Which he liked to do OFTEN.

Friends, you know I loved him dearly. But the first Christmas we spent at home after his death, I took that GD Santa Band down to the Transfer Station and left it there for some other sucker. You know what’s on my mantle now? Candles and fairy lights. AND I LIKE IT.

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN:  I am not much for decorations, but can I do the gift I hate that I grew to love? So. My husband's office has a gift exchange. He is famously known (at our house) for coming home with disaster gifts. Seriously, salsa lessons. Second-hand candles. Expired candy.  ANYWAY. Last year, he came home with an apple corer. AN APPLE CORER. And ordinary apple corer, red handle, sharp jagged metal prongs.   I said to him--no way. You have to go back to the office and tell them we are not accepting this apple corer. It's stupid. What kind of a present is that? And of course, that was silly because it was a Secret Santa, and no one can  even know who gave what to whom.. But then! I tried the apple corer. And it was MAGIC. I mean, magic. It works perfectly.  I love it every way. I wash it carefully, and protect it, and  care for it.  And I don't even know who to thank.

HALLIE EPHRON: I want that apple corer. Best gift anyone ever gave me that I didn’t know I wanted was an immersion blender. I didn’t even know such a thing existed, and now I use it all the time. And in case anyone’s taking notes, I’d love those salsa lessons. I’m not a big fan of pears, and I had a relative who, year after year, sent us Harry & David pears. I turned my nose up at them until one day, I tried one of them. Who knew a pear could taste that good?

RHYS BOWEN: Hallie, my publisher always sends me Harry and David. I’m going to poach some pears tonight. But Hank, Nothing good has ever come from a secret Santa I’ve watched others open bottles of wine, lovely gift baskets and I get….someone’s used clip on earrings!
I love all my current decorations but we have an Austrian angel chimes thingy that turns to the heat of the candles. One son in law always reverses the blades so it spins backward and all the camels get sick! And one year it caught on fire! 



JENN McKINLAY: I love my apple corer, Hank. I’m on my third one, having worn out the first two on apples for Hooligans. They also work on pears! I have a theory that my publisher sends pears to keep me healthy so I can hit my deadline. LOL.

Julia, I am absolutely dying at your relationship with Ross’s Santa band. Too funny! I honestly can’t think of any decoration I’ve received that I didn’t love. I’m pretty easy in that department. Truthfully, I’m probably the giver of gifts that people have had to grow to love, as sometimes my enthusiasm for a thing (one year it was geodes) tends to leave other people perplexed! 

DEBS: Rhys, I have a whole bowl of mixed pears that are all getting ripe at once. Share you poaching recipe!

Readers, confess! What's the decoration you loved to hate, but just couldn't let go? Or, maybe, like Julia, you could!

PS Now I am looking up apple corers!

 

42 comments:

  1. Hank, I love my apple corer, too.

    I can honestly say I don’t have a single decoration that I don’t like. My girls are the ones that send me decorations . . . they send me cute little handmade things with the grandbabies’ pictures on them . . . what’s not to love about that?

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    1. Joan, if for nothing else, the decorations made in pre-school and kindergarten are good for a laugh and a memory. In my family, my little brother's kindergarten class stamped out salt-flour cookies in the shape of Santa with a pack on his back, and then painted them. For some reason, Pat coated his with a thick layer of brilliant yellow. We called it the Christmas Chicken, and it took a place of honor on our tree every year. And every year (once he was old enough) we would tease him about it. I hope he has it on his family's tree now.

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    2. Memories bring smiles [and, sometimes, a few tears] . . . they remind us of the best part of ourselves.

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  2. Love them though I have homemade Christmas decorations that are now falling apart. I want to keep them for the memories. This year I decided not to get a tree because we have to put them out on the street on New Year's Eve! I remember that they still had Christmas trees up in early February in New Hampshire. Not here in California.

    Would love to see the recipe too, Deborah.

    Diana

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  3. Off the top of my head, I can't think of any ornament or decoration that I hated to see come back out of what was my mother's 20-something boxes of Christmas decorations.

    I suppose those early elementary school decorations that my siblings and I made would be the closest. They were some ugly things but they got used because we made them.

    Also, my mother had a lot of those Department 56 items. Not that they were ugly or anything but there was a LOT to unpack each year and then repack when the season was over.

    These days I don't decorate at all since it is just me at the house now. So all of the decorations stay packed up in the boxes in the shed or the rafters.

    Meanwhile, today is the office pizza party at my job and then tonight is my trivia team partners gathering. Then 5 whole days off!

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    1. Pizza party and trivia team meet up sounds like a delightful, no-stress way to spend Christmas Eve, Jay!

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    2. Julia, yes it should be relatively stress-free today so my calm remains undamaged.

      Tomorrow is a movie and dessert at a family friends. Thursday is trivia night. Friday is part 2 of my Christmas present to my co-worker, I'm buying her lunch.

      Busy but not stressed...I hope.

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  4. Not all of my ornaments make it out each year. I just have way too many. Some I love and wish I could pull out. But I've got a few I don't mind keeping hidden year after year. And there are even some I've bought that I now keep hidden.

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    1. Same here, Mark. The kids homemade ornaments make it onto the tree every year, but after that, I change it up. Some Christmases I go bright and glittery, others quiet and natural. And I buy a new piece or two (after the holiday, of course!) to mix in.

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    2. Same. The kids make the tree but everything else is up for debate!

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  5. The only decorations I had some doubts about at first were the two red, fluffy-tailed birds that clipped onto the Christmas tree. I think my kids liked them on my mother-in-law's Christmas tree when they were little, and that's why she gave them each one. I grew to love those little birds. The clip on so easily and they are a beautiful red. Also, my mother-in-law has never been a sentimental person, so it was rather special that she wanted the kids to have them, and with the ornaments I have from my mother, it's nice that my husband's family is represented on the tree, too.

    Julia, the Santa Band story is hilarious, and I must admit that I don't think I would have liked them either. Not a fan of loud, clanging noises. It reminds me of when we bought the kids stuffed reindeer toys that played Christmas music. It was fun, for a while, and then my husband and I dreaded hearing the reindeer start with their tunes. When the batteries finally ran down, we pretended that the reindeer were broken and couldn't be fixed. Yes, we did. Of course, the kids were very young, or we couldn't have gotten away with that.

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    1. Kathy, I'm laughing out loud at the "broken" reindeer. My father in law gave us a clock that played a different bird call every hour, and at 10 and 2 whatever the birds were would set our dog HOWLING. When the batteries wore out, I "forgot" to replace them, and we all lived in peace ever after.

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  6. Since almost every Christmas decoration is in storage and I don't have energy to get them, my little newly purchased, pre-lit tree is sitting on Grandma's trunk surrounded by two gourd figurines, a couple of bears and Granddad's old lantern. Do I actually have a decoration that I loved to hate but hold on to? No, I got rid of all of Grandma's red plastic flower arrangements and red velvet wreath years ago. I only keep the elf figurines, they aren't that elf on a shelf thing, and her Madonna with the antique red electric candles. I got so sick of those all red ornaments and decorations that went in exactly the same place every year and thankfully we never had any decorations that made noise. Err, I mean played beautiful music.

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  7. Julia, I love the Santa band story!

    And anyone wanting to get rid of pears can send them my way.

    My mom had a musical joy old St. Nick. Ceramic, it stands about a foot tall. You wind him up and he sways back and forth to "Santa Claus is coming tonight." As he winds down, the song and the dancing get slower and slower and sloooowwwwerrrr... I never hated him but I never expected that he'd be the one thing of all my mom's decorations I'd keep. But there he is, on my shelf.

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  8. Oh, these stories! Rhys, my sister brought one of those heat-propelled things home from Germany and it always seemed dangerous to me. Julia, we know you loved Ross - you let him have his Santa band all those years. ;^)

    I keep hauling out the paper Santas my sons made in school. One has very manic eyes and the other is a triple amputee by now. I don't hate them at all but they're looking a little worse for the wear.

    Merry Christmas, Reds!

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    1. Edith, my son made a Christmas mouse which, when the non-decorated side shows, strongly resembles... well, the mouse is long and cylindrical with two large, round ears underneath. I'll let you envision it.

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    2. Julia, you made me snort my coffee!

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  9. Oh, Julia, I applaud you for getting rid of Santa's Band. If you'd just buried it in a closet somewhere, you might relent and grow nostalgic some day . . . Yeah. That way lies madness. Enjoy your candles and fairy lights.

    I'm not big on Christmas decorations, so I had to make that "delighted" face when a student I worked with gave me a motion-activated musical reindeer (think Big Billy Bass with antlers) one year for Christmas. She was clearly thrilled with it, as musical Christmas decor was a big deal in her family. I loved that she shared but that thing was ugly. No way it was getting pride of place near any active pathway in my house. Worse yet, it played "Jingle Bell Rock," my least favorite carol because it was my high school band's Christmas parade song, so I heard it over and over and over again every first period, for four long marching seasons. The reindeer had to go. But it was a gift of love, so it didn't go with extreme prejudice. I kept it until I learned a coworker loved those motion-activated things. LOVED. THEM. Then I stuck it in the annual white elephant gift exchange, knowing she would fight off all comers to get it and keep it. I'm happy to say the rockin' reindeer is now a cherished member of someone else's happy home.

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    1. Oh, that must’ve been so funny, at least once… :-) !

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  11. I’ll do a post about that Apple corer some day soon! And I agree, secret Santa gift exchanges are so often disappointing… Why is that? and yes, the pears! I do love them, and the apples that come with it, and the box I get from my publisher always includes a fresh pineapple! I go crazy over that. SO delicious. And I am making poached pears, too! Isn’t that funny? Well, actually I am doing them in the microwave, scooped out with the Apple corer :-) then add sugar and cinnamon, then nuke, and top with whipped cream for Jonathan and yogurt for me. So yummy and easy!

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  12. Quilted nylon bathrobes I never wore. Used pewter collectibles. Toys "too good" for the kids to play with. I have boxes of Xmas decorations labeled with the last year I used them. I'm in the middle of a whole house purge, so next December, off they go.

    Julia, Santa's band wins. I never had anything that obnoxious to deal with.

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    1. The worst sting, Margaret? When I looked online for a picture to send to Debs, I found sets going on eBay for $100!!

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  13. I had the opposite problem--something I loved but everyone else thought needed to go. My first Christmas tree in my own home--no money for elaborate decorations, so I made a silver chain from tinfoil loops that wound all around the tree. With the tree lights glowing, it sparkled and two little boys were delighted. Big boys in the years which followed, not so delighted. But the memory of that first year kept it on the tree until even I had to admit it was time to put it to rest.

    And Julia, thankfully it is my brother-in-law who collected those singing, dancing Christmas decorations! The only one I think I could stand in my home is his Santa that reads a story when you attach a book to his hand.

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  14. I don't think I ever had a decoration that I could not stand

    Julia you made me laugh out loud. You certainly made someone else happy in letting it go. Taste differs from one to the other.
    About yesterday, I came back late and replied with my maple syrup squares recipe. I had to translate and I hope it is clear enough. I cut in 32 little squares.

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  15. After 2 house fires and two separate losses of Christmas decorations I no longer have any hideous one. But sadly the most meaningful ones are all gone. After the second fire which was in late November a bunch of neighbors gave me their cast off ornaments. At least there was something to decorate the tree but they truly looked like things people had been planning to throw out anyway. But it's the thought that counts. Merry Christmas to you all!

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    1. Oh, Judi, how hard that must be! I hope the memory of the donated (ugly) decorations grows to become a happy story in your family of how you survived and kept on going. Merry Christmas!

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  16. Thank you, Danielle! I'll copy it out and give it a try!

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  17. Debs, I don't really have a recipe for pears. I usually cut them in half, scoops out the core, fill with brown sugar, a little cinnamon, and then pour a little apple juice with a hint of brandy or whatever liqueur i can find then cook slowly in the oven. I don't think you can go wrong with pears. Merry Christmas

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    1. Thank you, Rhys! That sounds yummy.

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    2. Thank you, Rhys. That sounds similar to my Mom's recipe. Yes, it is yummy!

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  18. Julia, I love the Santa band story!

    For me, it's the colored glass ball ornaments. I never wanted to have them on my tree. But The Hubby insisted since they'd been a staple of his childhood. They come out every year, although naturally a few have broken over two decades. And now we have a second tree (all white, which I also didn't expect to like, but I do) the colored balls have found a home.

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  19. Debs, buy a good apple corer, not a cheap one. We have one from Pampered Chef that has lasted longer than several cheap ones.

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  20. I still have some ornaments on my tree with strips of braid and sequins that I think I made in elementary school! I put them in the back for fillers!

    But one of my favorite decorations is the wooden Santa my daughter made in Montessori school. He's painted and just so charming. He has pride of place on the "Santa table" every year.

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  21. I still have some ornaments my son made. My favorite goes on top every year. A construction paper angel painted in green, brown, and yellow. I call it my camouflage angel. It gets the place of honor every year. If I don’t care for some decorations they remain in one of the boxes. No one comments because I’m the one who’s stuck with decorating. As long as the green elephant with the goofy trunk is on the tree Frank is happy. It belonged to one of his aunts in Louisiana. He made so much fun of it that she gave it to him.
    I refuse to allow tinsel in the house. I hated putting it on the tree when I was a kid. BORING. I’d grab handfuls and fling them on the tree to make the job go faster. And then after Christmas we had to take it off to save for next year. As for bad gifts I think the worst was a peach scented candle. Smelled like rotten fruit.

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    1. Pat, the peach scented candle sounds disgusting! And we haven't done tinsel since I was a kid, but I was the child who hung every strand...

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  22. I think that I liked all our decorations when we first had them. Since it's just me now, I've pruned out the damaged ones and ones that I didn't love. The paper maiche snowball that I made in grade school had the newspaper showing through! I still put tinsel on my tree that is from my childhood. Mom used to take it off strand by strand and put it on the cardboard form it came one. I tried that the year after she died and ended up shoving it all into a ziploc bag! Wishing all a Merry Christmas!

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  23. One of my oldest friends gave me a white polar/teddy bear dressed up for Christmas in a cute little vest. That seemed fine, until we pressed his hand and his cheeks glowed red and he played Christmas carols. Our dog, being a reasonable soul, thought this was absolutely too freaky, and the first time she saw this she barked like mad. Afterward she circled that stuffed animal, growling and eyeing him suspiciously. Time didn't lessen her protective instincts, so we passed him along to another (unsuspecting) family.

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