6 Holiday Traditions Fading Into Obscurity

[Liberal_in_LA]

I love the look of the old timey hot high wattage bulbs


6 Holiday Traditions Fading Into Obscurity

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When the percentage of shoppers buying ornaments, garlands and other bits of seasonal decor fell from 71.2% in 2007 to just 64.4% in 2009, it seemed to shock retailers and retail observers that shoppers would actually hang on to decorations and use them more than once. :)

Sometimes, however, the bloom just falls from the poinsettia as the culture shifts its gaze to newer, prettier things. ABC(DIS_) found this out the hard way last year when the halting and didactic dialogue, mid-20th Century animation and overlong run time of A Charlie Brown Christmas not only came in behind an episode of Glee and lost more than 800,000 viewers in its second half-hour, but dropped more than 30% of its audience from the year before.

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1. Office holiday party
2. tinsel

Tinsel
Tinsel dates back to 17th century Germany, when little strands of silver were used to make trees sparkle from the light of flickering candles attached to it. Covering a tree with silver wasn't the cheapest decorating solution in the world, so tinsel was usually reserved for folks with enough coin to throw away precious metals every year.

That all changed as cheaper materials were introduced in the early 20th century. The good news was that boxes of tinsel became ubiquitous and could turn any tree into a sparkling crystal centerpiece. The bad news? Some of that tinsel was aluminum mixed with lead that helped it hang better on tree branches, but also exposed generations of children to lead poisoning and brain defects. :-(

3. Aluminum trees
4. high wattage lights
5. Spray cans of fake snow
6. "it's a wonderful life" - copy right issues means it airs less

http://www.thestreet.com/story/11321615/7/6-holiday-traditions-fading-into-obscurity.html

[Morning Dew]

1. Thank heavens it's not the Airing of Grievances.

[Initech]

2. I've got a lot of problems with you people!!!!!

Festivus +1 :rofl:

[Morning Dew]

23. Next up - Feats of Strength.

:rofl:

[ProudToBeBlueInRhody]

46. FESTIVUS DOESN'T END UNTIL YOU PIN ME GEORGE!

[ProudToBeBlueInRhody]

45. KRUEGER....YOUR COMPANY STINKS!!!

YOU DON'T KNOW WHAT THE HELL YOU'RE DOING!!!

[Initech]

47. Human Fund - Money For People.

"Maybe this is my way of giving something back."
"You want to give something back start with the $20,000."

[Morning Dew]

65. generate your own Human Fund certificates

http://www.webpageaboutnothing.com/

[joeglow3]

55. I find tinsel distracting

[KamaAina]

58. It has to be used judiciously

A tree carpeted with tinsel? Yeah, distracting.

[secondwind]

3. I have a DVD of 'It's a Wonderful Life'.... we watch it once a year at Thanksgiving.

[rfranklin]

National Lampoon Christmas Vacation is our family favorite...

"Shitter's full!"

[Initech]

25. Christmas Vacation and Bad Santa are my two personal faves.

[Frank Cannon]

49. Those are my two favorites too!

People need to look past the vulgarity and see Bad Santa for the genuinely heartwarming Christmas movie that it is.

[KamaAina]

59. You only need one Christmas movie. That movie is "A Christmas Story".

You'll shoot your eye out, kid!

[rfranklin]

5. Dupe

"Shitter's full!"

[Taverner]

4. When did we have aluminum trees?

You mean, like, fake pine needles made of aluminum?

[begin_within]

7. We had one when I was a kid.

This isn't my picture but it is illustrative of the type of tree that was popular in the 1960s. They usually came with a light and a color wheel that rotated in front of the light, changing the color of the tree every few seconds. I think they are still available now as a retro Christmas style of tree, but they were pretty popular in the 1960s, until people got tired of them and wanted the natural smell of a real tree again.

[Liberal_in_LA]

14. yes, after the alum tree fad faded, my family alternated between real tree and

the latest fad in fake trees. One year it would be "I'm tired of sweeping up needles". the next it would be "I love the smell of a real tree". lol

[Arkansas Granny]

24. And that's one tradition I was not sorry to see the last of. I hated those

aluminum trees.

[Art_from_Ark]

43. In A Charlie Brown Christmas, first aired in 1966, Lucy tells Charlie Brown

to get a "big, shiny, aluminum Christmas tree".

The people in my neighborhood would get their trees from the local elementary school after winter vacation had started-- 13 classrooms meant that there were 13 discarded Christmas trees for the taking.

[Liberal_in_LA]

8. we had one in the 60s. they were the latest fad. the needles were white.

[NRaleighLiberal]

9. My grandmother had an aluminum tree!

Yes, the "needles" are strips of foil. You can't put lights on it - you aim a color wheel spot light at it, so the tree reflects green, then blue, then yellow, then red light.

My parents bought a WHITE fake tree - we endured it for far too many years!

[begin_within]

21. The color wheel was the only cool thing about it.

[Liberal_in_LA]

26. read this and weep:

By 1989, it was not uncommon to find aluminum Christmas trees for sale in yard sales or at estate sales being sold for as little as 25 cents. In recent years, however, the aluminum Christmas tree has seen a re-emergence in popularity. Collectors began buying and selling the trees, especially on online auction web sites. A rare 7-foot-tall pink aluminum Christmas tree sold on Internet for $3,600 in 2005.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aluminum_Christmas_tree

[MADem]

12. The Sixties--there was an ugly, multicolored spotlight thing that you could

train on the silvery monstrosity. It would click from color to color--ugliest damn thing on the planet.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aluminum_Christmas_tree

[Liberal_in_LA]

16. lol! it was the great new fad.

[MADem]

29. Yes, it was. Didn't last long, though. They quickly went from "cool" to "stupid" and

thence to "pathetic."

Of course, if you wait long enough, the lame, out-of-fashion item becomes "retro" and, because people who want to appear to be ahead of the curve are eager to embrace the fad anew, they also become "expensive."

You might be able to make some money if you have one, from someone who is embracing the Sixties Chic.

[Taverner]

20. OMG...so that's where those 60s bands got that rotating color wheel!

I always wondered - now I know!

[MADem]

30. It's true--ghastly effect, but pretty jazzy at the time! nt

[RC]

18. thaey was popular in the United States from 1958 until about the mid-1960s.

Before your time, I suspect.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aluminum_Christmas_tree

[lbrtbell]

27. I hope you're joking?

They still make them! :)
http://www.amazon.com/BOS-Genuine-Aluminum-Christmas-Tree/dp/B000KBD9CU

[Liberal_in_LA]

28. he/she has probably seen them but not realized their were aluminum

probably pictures something different, not a white tree, but a foil looking thing.

[SheilaT]

41. We had one starting in 1962. It had the

rotating three-colored light. At the time, I considered it sad, because we'd moved almost two thousand miles across the country (to leave an abusive father/husband) and it was the symbol of all that we'd lost. Now, I would love to find an aluminum tree with the rotating light, because it would remind me of the new life we started there and then.

[Frank Cannon]

51. My grandmother had one, with the rotating light.

Although it may seem bizarre to those that never experienced the effect, it was actually pretty neat. I miss it.

Guess you had to be there.

[a la izquierda]

6. I love fat lights, as my best friend calls them.

She hates them, however. The fat lights, or C9s, are still around.

[Jello Biafra]

10. I have some fat c9's....

but they are LED lights that are much more energy efficient.

[MADem]

15. I have some too--old school look, very efficient. I like 'em, too. NT

[a la izquierda]

34. My husband says we'll get some...

as soon as we're back in a house (in an apartment now). We're both kids born in the '70s.

[MADem]

37. I actually have a set from the fifties--I don't dare fire 'em up, but I can't

bring myself to toss them, either. The LED faux ones will have to do!

[begin_within]

11. Those C7 and C9 lights have a warm, welcoming look.

The LED lights being sold today have a cold look to me.

[Liberal_in_LA]

19. yep. the LEDs are super cold. I do a double take when I see a house covered

with the fat lights. love em.

[a la izquierda]

35. It's true, but they are more efficient, so I guess they'll do.

But I prefer the gaudy 70s/80s look too :)

[Dawson Leery]

40. The LED's have a cold look indeed. They are harsh.

[NRaleighLiberal]

13. I loved the fat lights too - they were the favorite of vandals in our RI neighborhood -

kids would come at night, unscrew the ones they could reach, and smash them in the road. We always suspected the paper boy!

[a la izquierda]

33. Hahaha, I had similar experiences as a kid...

my dad would put up fat lights, and every year, we'd have broken strands of fat lights.
It's amazing the man didn't have a heart attack with rage.

[pipi_k]

48. Oh lord, this is why

I have mixed feelings about those things.

My father would go crazy trying to untangle them, first (no matter how carefully you pack them away, they tangle themselves during the off season).

Then he would try to find the ONE bulb that was out, causing the entire string not to light.

After that, it would be a struggle for him to get them on the tree PERFECTLY.


The entire family was stressed out by this point, having listened to over an hour of angry cursing.


BUT...once they were on the tree, and the ornaments and tinsel placed, it was magic. I would often lie on the floor beneath the tree (when lit) and revel in the beautiful colors and smell of pine. :)

[a la izquierda]

52. This was my house growing up

http://youtu.be/SHpMZPYWDm0

[pipi_k]

61. Sounds sort of festive, in a way...

:+

[a la izquierda]

62. More or less...

I had an interesting upbringing.

[begin_within]

36. Kids did that to ours too. They made a pop when you threw them on the ground.

The insides were vacuum, so when you threw one to the ground it made a pretty good little pop. So kids would always unscrew them and throw them.

[JoePhilly]

38. I grew up in Philly, and we had the fat lights too ... and we also had the

kids who would steal them ... just to pop them.

When I can find them, I still use them, but its getting harder to find them.

I usually end up covering the front bushes in the smaller colored lights, while the neighbors go for the tiny white lights. They seem to go for the dignified look.

My one neighbor wraps his porch support columns in candy cane lights. I like it.

[Wait Wut]

60. Those are the ones we use.

We just bought more at Loew's (or however it's spelled).

Calling them "fat lights" is discriminatory. I call the my "Charlie Brown lights" or "Snoopy lights". :)

[cherokeeprogressive]

39. More than a few dozen fell victim to my Daisy BB Gun.

I'd say there are probably still BB's stuck in the eaves of houses on two streets I lived on as a kid.

[NRaleighLiberal]

17. There are some great really old C6, C7 and C9 sets on ebay

they are not cheap....but very nostalgic looking at the offerings

[Initech]

22. Actually it's a good thing 4 of the 6 are going away.

Aluminum trees? High wattage lights? None of these are very environmentally friendly.

[jmowreader]

31. The Festivus Pole seems sacred...

One year when I was a Home Depot employee, I got a garbage can from the Garden department, put a dozen 7-foot line posts out of the chain link fencing display in it, signed it "Festivus Poles" with the price and SKU, stuck it up at the front of the department and refilled it three times before management noticed anything. (I, fortunately, had a manager whose attitude was, 'if it's working, go for it!')

On another note, they DO sell LED retrofit bulbs for your old high-wattage Christmas tree light strands. You get the effect of the old familiar lights but less power draw than the miniature lights.

[Kali]

42. BWAHAHAHAHAHHA!!!!!!

Festivus Poles :rofl: :applause:

[Paka]

32. Memory Lane!

My family never went the Aluminum tree route. The smell of pine at Christmas was as important as the shortbread and the yummy cookies we made ourselves. Not until after dad died and mom was living alone in the 70's did she switch to a fake tree. :hippie:

[madamesilverspurs]

44. Alas, bubble lights... n/t

[AngryAmish]

50. Seems there are fewer people every year at our Christmas Eve cockfight

But I got lil AA raising her bantam for the big event this year. Just three and loves, loves, luvvvzzz her cockfighting.

[mwooldri]

53. "Office" holiday party????

Heck, here they did away with the office. We work from home now.

So there's not even an office to have an office party at! The best we can do is some in-formal get-together with our workfriends and go to an appropriate party place (an "Irish-themed pub" bar comes to mind).

Tinsel, not out of style here. Never had an aluminium tree. As for high wattage lights - I won't miss them, neither the fake snow. "It's a Wonderful Life" seems more American. Though The Street's article cites the copyright holder unhappy at hearing America sing about Auld Lang Syne... well that song's been out of copyright for years... they're going on about the whole piece, which won't be out of copyright now until 2068 at the earliest (1948 + 120 years).

[joeglow3]

54. Die Hard is the best Christmas movie. nt

[LibertyLover]

56. We have a 3 foot tall purple and silver aluminum tree

which is just right for our Ravens ornaments, since the team's colors are purple, white and black. This year we are putting it on the back porch, facing our next door neighbor's house because his 15 year old daughter is a big Steelers fan. We do have an artificial "natural" looking tree, but that's because whenever we have a real tree, our male dogs immediately think "Indoor plumbing - finally!". They just look at us like we are crazy when we haul out the artificial tree, but thankfully don't lift their legs on it.

[chaska]

57. Good god, I hate all of those things! Good riddance, I say.

[MerryBlooms]

63. Good riddance to 99% of that stuff. I do however, love the old big lights. n/t

[Gidney N Cloyd]

64. Major Awards will never go out of style.

All the way from Italy: