Dick continued a Klade family tradition that dates back nearly 150 years when he celebrated his 80th birthday on January 1. Dick's
grandfather Friedrich C. Klade and father Fred J. Klade both were born on Christmas Day. Our New Years guy
somehow picked the wrong holiday to arrive (his mother always joked that he was
stubborn), but for us it is a special day nonetheless.
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| We more than a half century ago began carrying on family traditions when decorating our Christmas tree. Here we chatted before a completed tree while son Lee rode "Blaze." Blaze was a gift from his Grandfather Ed Steinmetz. Our matching sweaters were gifts knitted by Sandy's Mom, Vannie Steinmetz. |
We've just finished an annual task that has been a family tradition
for decades. Both Dick and Sandy 's parents decorated their Christmas trees in silver and blue every year, and we
adopted an identical practice more than 50 years ago in our first year of
marriage.
The tree decor always has featured only blue ornaments. Until it became impossible to buy good quality tinsel, family members meticulously placed tinsel strips in every available space, a process that took many hours. We now maintain the silver look with strips of glass and snow flakes.
The blue glass ornaments we bought during our first year
together have faded a bit with age, but all have survived a half dozen moves in
their original thin cardboard boxes and many annual unpackings
and repackings.
They bring us joy year after year.
May you enjoy happiness continuing the good things in your
life in 2017 and many years beyond.
6 comments:
Norhing like keep family traditions going. When my wife died and my home was a single male home with my son, my late father and me for four years. During that period, some of the traditions that my wife had followed as desired by my late mother, were discontinued. When my son got married again and Manjiree came into our home, she has revived two of those traditions and I am always touched by her doing that as it means a great deal to me.
Wonderful that you still have and observe some Christmas traditions. We had many when I was growing up in a family with five kids. But as we all married and started our own families, those traditions were mostly lost to whatever new ones we started. Sadly the only one my spouse and I established was fighting every year because I wanted to do "our" Christmas at home and his mom insisted we spend it with her, wherever that might be. It becamse such a bone of contention every year that I came to hate the holiday. But that was many years ago, and these days I just join my son and grandkids to enjoy a few hours of their Christmas. I do wish a joyous holiday to everyone who observes it, complete with all their traditions and memories and faded blue Christmas balls. Those are the best ornaments, you know -- the faded and worn ones, the ones that have become a part of your family and whisper of Christmases past.
Grandma Vannie was a prolific knitter, just like my great grandma. they were talented in those days.
It's important to keep up those traditions ... altho' we gave up on tinsel quite a few years ago.
I love family traditions. Everybody seems to have evolved different ways to celebrate that are most meaningful. I love those matching sweaters. The blue ornaments idea is wonderful. It's so pretty.
just like my great grandma.thanks for this comment..
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