Some of this sounded like our house! However, my dad decorated the tree always! We of course didn't see it until morning. Their first child was born in 1917 and died two years later. He died two months after his second Christmas in 1920. My mother sent me all the ornaments that they had, some going back to Henry Jr's first Christmas. Some had candle wax on them. I still have a garland of small red beads that is still long enough to put on the tree! My daughter wants to someday had a talk with my father about decoration. She feels that he passed on his tree decorating talents and instructions on to me. She is wrong. It's in the genes! That is wonderful about getting branches and drilling holes to stick the branches in. German ingenuity! Just before the icicles went on, all the garlands went on. If we made something in school, it went on too. He also had a habit concerning tree ornaments. When Electric lights came in, the early strings were sockets into which a light was screwed. Some of these were too pretty for him to throw away when they blew out. He tied a string around the socket end, and hung it on the tree. I still have one or two left that I put on our tree. I just found his family in 2008, and how I wish it had been sooner. I think it would have thrilled him to know his family even though I have some holes. Besides, he could have translated for me. Merry Christmas everyone. Dorothea To: schleswig-holstein-roots@rootsweb.com Subject: Re: [SCHLESWIG-HOLSTEIN-ROOTS] How was Christmas celebrated? too told of the tree not being put up until Christmas Eve behind a closed door, not to be seen until Christmas morning. My dad didn't go quite that far but we didn't go out to get our tree until about 3 days before Christmas and we would freeze while he took us around to just about every tree lot around to find the perfect tree. If he didn't find the perfect tree he would get extra branches and when he got home would drill holes in the tree trunk and then put the branches in the holes. The decorating was perfectly done too. The icicles went on last and we didn't DARE throw one on - it had to be perfectly hung. All the decorations stayed up until Jan 6 which was the 12th day of Christmas. In Germany my mother said they had real candles on the tree too