Christmas at the Little House was a greatly anticipated event! The living room was decorated fully. There was holly. Sometimes mistletoe. The Christmas tree would be a cedar. All the greenery came from nearby woods. Decorations were well planned, and carried over from year to year. I mentioned that Daddy smoked camels. Inside the pack there was foil, lined on one side with white paper. You could burn the paper off, and leave a shiny sheet of bright aluminum foil. A little work with scissors, and there were icicles!
Mama would pop popcorn, and use a needle to thread through and make a nice decoration. Sycamore balls were good. I think they were rapped with foil, sometimes. There were no electric lights in the early years—no electricity! There were some glass trinkets—balls on a wire hook.
The tree was nailed to a board, and stood upright on the floor. I think a wire held it upright, but the board may have been nailed to the floor. The tree always stood by the front door. Those icicles glistened reflections of the fire, and caught whatever other light there was. Excitement blended perfectly with absolute joy!
A gold star topped the tree. I think that Wade still has it.
On Christmas morning, there would be presents. Cap pistols. Balls to play with. Apples and Oranges and candy. An a little later bb guns. Daisy bb guns. (We hunted birds with those bb guns, but before Harper Lee had gone to print, Daddy gave us to understand that we were not to shoot mocking birds.) Tinkertoys. It was hard for us to contain ourselves on the night before, and the event itself was never disappointing.
When Uncle Hickman or Uncle Dee Mote showed up in a car to take us to Grandmother Mote’s for lunch, the emotions were always mixed. We had to leave the toys! But, looking forward to seeing all the Mote cousins helped overcome the disappointment! We always went to Grandmother Mote’s for Christmas. The excitement would build as we neared the destination. We always had turkey. And dressing. And Ambrosia. And always told and heard the same stories, but never tired of them.
But in the very early years there was a strange custom. Everyone could not eat at the table at the same time. There were too many. But the old folks ate first and the children had “second table.” Thank goodness, that custom, which I suspect was very general in those days, didn’t survive. It probably ended by the early fifties.
After a wonderful day of food and visiting, we got our bag of apples and oranges from Grandmother, and got to ride in a car back home. It always felt good to get back to the toys and Christmas goodies at the Little House. But we will visit Grandmother and Granddaddy Mote’s place for my birthdays, before we finish writing! I was born on my Granddaddy Mote’s birthday!
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