Well, the festive season is over. The presents have either been appreciated and used or returned for refund, resolutions have been made to lose weight and get in shape, and the Christmas tree has been kicked to the curb. While these thoughts are fresh in our minds, it’s time to have a little chat about the old pagan ritual just passed, the bringing of green boughs into the house during the winter solstice.
Needless to say, this Pagan ritual has been co-opted by other religious and secular groups. The net result was that from all of this was begat the Christmas tree. And perhaps more important than the green boughs themselves were that, at some point, folks decided it would be a good idea to adorn these things with bobbles and treats. The Christmas tree decoration phenomena was conceived and hatched. This little narrative is all about how we have chosen to adorn our large, very expensive, yet very beautiful green boughs.
History of the Christmas Tree
Given that this is all about decorations for the Christmas tree, perhaps a brief overview of how we ended up with the Christmas tree concept is in order. According to Wikipedia, this is how it all happened… Roughly. 🙂
From Wikipedia:
According to the Encyclopedia Britannica, “The use of evergreen trees, wreaths, and garlands to symbolize eternal life was a custom of the ancient Egyptians, Chinese, and Hebrews. Tree worship was common among the pagan Europeans and survived their conversion to Christianity in the Scandinavian customs of decorating the house and barn with evergreens at the New Year to scare away the devil and of setting up a tree for the birds during Christmas time”
These early rituals were, of course, later adopted widely in Europe, and ultimately became what we now refer to as the Christmas tree.
Again, according to Wikipedia, this is how it all happened:
Modern Christmas trees originated in Central Europe and the Baltic states, particularly Estonia, Germany and Livonia (now Latvia) during the Renaissance in early modern Europe. Its 16th-century origins are sometimes associated with Protestant Christian reformer Martin Luther, who is said to have first added lighted candles to an evergreen tree.
Read the whole Wikipedia entry about the beloved Christmas tree’s origins here.
Our Christmas Tree Tradition
I am a bit of a throwback in that I insist on setting up a live tree every year. I guess my Irish DNA has caused me to fully embrace my inner Pagan and the green bough thing. 🙂 But I digress. I will not be delving further down into the history of the Christmas tree, but rather a discussion about how we have decided to festoon our own trees over the years.
Many years ago, on our honeymoon, we picked up a cute little Christmas tree decoration that you will see here in a second, and I guess at some point we decided that would be a good tradition to carry on. In the nearly 30 years of travel since, we have picked up a large assortment of Christmas tree ornaments and doodads (identifying the places we have visited) to hang on our tree. So, this piece is all about this tradition and the memories attached to some of those decorations.
I suppose I am also saying, it might not be a bad idea to pick up the odd Christmas tree decoration in the places you travel to so that they jog your memory about your trips when you are decorating the Christmas tree every December… You know, if you do the Christmas tree thing.
Our Travel Decorations … the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
This idea to share our Christmas tree tradition and show off some of the collection all started as a simple post on my personal Facebook page. Our family and friends know we travel a lot, and I think most of them knew about this tradition of picking up things to hang on the tree. At some point, I decided that they needed to see some of the ornaments. This year I realized this was a blog post in the making. So here we go.
On my Facebook page, I just randomly threw up pictures of our decorations with a notation about where they were from. I decided for this article I needed to put more thought into that and get these things organized in some sort of meaningful format.
To that end, I am going to group the photos for this little narrative into small, identifiable collections. But let’s kick off this little undertaking with a picture of the Christmas tree we set up in our home for Christmas 2024. Why not, it was a particularly beautiful tree… A Fraser Fir.
I’m going to be using photo carousels here again, so please remember that to have each collection pop up into a much larger view. You simply click on the first image on the left-hand side and then sift your way through the pictures.
The first little grouping is about a few simple traditions that must take place at the beginning of the ornament hanging process. First up is that we open up our Christmas tree ornament box and rediscover whatever objects were gathered during our travel over the past year.
When we come home from travel, the first thing we do is throw the Christmas tree objects into the box without looking at them again. This means many months later when we open the box, we are often surprised by what we collected that year. Age has a way of making you forget these things of course. 🙂
The first item that goes up is little globe that sits atop the tree, sort of tying together our decorations from all over the world. This was given to me by a former colleague. Next step, is the hanging of the first tree decoration we ever bought together… On our honeymoon in 1996.
Additionally, special mention must go out to the masked Santa we ordered during the pandemic. This little beauty is too heavy to actually hang on the tree, so it sits with a bunch of other Christmas accoutrements on an end table, reminding us of that oh so fun period in our lives. 🙂
After that, we just start hanging them up in no particular order. Just whatever comes out of the boxes each time we reach in.
Although we hang them in no particular order, my OCD-like compulsions require me to present these objects to you as separate collections. And I have decided to do it by continent basically. First up, stops in Europe.
Europe
And what better place to begin our meandering wanderings across Europe? Why, France, of course. After that, we will take a bike ride around Lake Constance and then make stops in Germany, the Iberian Peninsula, the UK and Ireland, followed by a myriad of other stops in other countries.
France
And we won’t begin in just any place in France. It must begin in Paris, the “City of Light,” which we have visited many times.
Bicycle Trip Around Lake Constance
You may have read the two-part piece I wrote about this wonderful bike trip we did around Lake Constance several years ago. I hardly ever make travel recommendations because people don’t necessarily have the same interests that I have, but this was a great thing to do. If this tweaks some interest for you rather than have me explain it all to you go back to and read “Biking in Europe #1 … How We Did It“.
Germany
There are lots of interesting places to visit in Germany. Don’t overlook it when you are planning your next trip to Europe.
The Iberian Peninsula … Spain, Portugal, Gibraltar
For the record, the Iberian Peninsula is host to Spain, Portugal, and Great Britain’s Gibraltar. It sort of sits apart from the rest of Europe and would definitely be a great place to spend an entire European getaway.
Spain
You can usually find Christmas tree decorations for purchase in most cities in Spain. Córdoba is just one of several places where we have picked up an actual Christmas tree ball. Córdoba is a great city to visit because it houses four UNESCO world heritage sites. The most important of these is probably the Great Mosque of Cordoba.
When I got my Córdoba purchase back to the hotel, I realized that someone had stuck the hanging ribbon on the bottom of the decoration… Perhaps someone in an Asian sweat shop that didn’t understand stylized English letters??? 🙂 I was about to return it and exchange it for one that was assembled properly, but quickly realized the upside-down decoration was a more fun object to be hanging on our tree every year.
Portugal and Gibraltar
The UK and Ireland
I should clarify that we don’t spend a lot of time looking for these items that we hang on our tree. Typically, we’ll see a gift store at some point and wander in and grab something. Short and sweet.
Scotland
That said, it did not happen in a short and sweet manner on a recent visit to Scotland. It almost became an Olympic event because we dedicated so much time to it. And after much searching and many stops in various shops, we were completely shut out. We couldn’t find a thing that we thought was suitable. Perhaps that’s why we hadn’t picked up something for the tree on a previous visit to Scotland.
As we walked back to the hotel in the rain with our heads hanging low, I spied an object in the gutter that literally stunned me when I spied it. There lying in the mud and water was the item that you see first in this collection. I reached down and picked up this little stuffed map of Scotland, which at the time was all covered in mud and soaked in water.
As you can see, it was obviously a Christmas tree decoration because it already had a string attached to it. After I got it back to the hotel, it cleaned up beautifully and it is now one of our prized ornaments because it has such a great story attached to it.
Ireland
We have been to my “homeland” before, but that time we primarily spent our time in and around Dublin. The second time we spent three weeks travelling through the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland, before taking the ferry across the Irish Sea to Scotland.
The Rest of Europe
We have not done this in quite a while now, but in the past, a preferred excursion was to fly into Europe armed with rail passes and wander around from country to country for a couple of months. I think we need to do that again sometime soon.
The first item here is from a country I really think everyone should try and visit, Iceland. It is only about a four-hour flight from Toronto, and you can see some amazing geological sites on a day bus trip out of Reykjavík the capital. Reykjavík is a fun little city to explore as well!
Asia
Over the years, we have been fortunate enough to spend time touring around Asia. Perhaps most interesting amongst those were extended stays in Hong Kong, where we lived and worked a couple times, all the while living on the campus of the Chinese University of Hong Kong. Hong Kong is a very interesting place to live or visit. I think a lot of folks think it is simply one densely packed island, but in fact, there are over 200 islands and a section of the mainland that make up the territory.
First in this collection is an item we picked up on one of those many islands, Cheung Chao island, which is referred to as “suicide island” by Hong Kong residents. The island is a bit of a getaway retreat for folks from Hong Kong, but over the years it has become infamous because people have gone there and killed themselves in a unique way while staying in a hotel room. I was surprised to find the following linked Globe and Mail article about the concept. Give it a read if you are a little incredulous about whether this is a real thing or not.
You will notice that some of these things are just keychains. I am impressed by the number of places in the world where you can actually buy souvenir Christmas tree decorations. But some places just don’t have them, and you have to make do with what is available.
Africa
We have only been to Africa a couple of times, but one visit was an extended stay with friends in the country of Senegal. It is a totally amazing life experience to be deeply immersed in the culture living with an African family on this incredible continent. I hope we will get back there again.
North America
Well, of course we have experienced some travels around Canada and some parts of the United States over the years and we did pick up a few items in our travels to these places as well.
The USA
First up, as you can see, is a very patriotic Christmas ball that we picked up not long after the events of September 11, 2001. The 9/11 event was particularly real and visceral to us because we were in San Diego, California when it happened.
Canada
I am almost embarrassed to say that we do not have anything from Western Canada hanging on our tree. Prior to beginning the gathering up of Christmas tree decorations, I used to spend many, many weeks each year travelling on business through the western provinces. Time to get out there and bring back something to show for it. 🙂
Maritimes
We have spent a ton of time visiting the Maritimes, however, and came close to buying a vacation property down there once. A favourite destination is Nova Scotia. But we have spent time in all the other maritime provinces as well.
Quebec
If you have been reading posts on my blog for a long time, you will have noticed that I have written about a number of interesting places in La Belle Province. Quebec is another favourite destination of ours including Montreal, the Eastern Townships, Quebec City, the Charlevoix region, and the Gaspé region. We have been to all of them multiple times and will return again I am certain.
Art Galleries
As I was going through all the photos of our Christmas tree decorations, I noted that three of them were from art galleries. I am thinking they deserve a special category here as well. 🙂 I must remember when I am next at the Prado in Madrid, to pick up something from there to add to the “gallery” collection. 🙂
Oh no! I forgot one of my favourite decorations, my official John Prine Christmas tree ball… Purchased from the Oh Boy Records online store. John loved Christmas and had a Christmas tree set up in his house year-round.
That said, there is a bit of a travel element to this. We had attended the four day “All the Best” music festival put on by John Prine in the Dominican Republic just days before I was smitten with sepsis in 2019. John himself died a few months later from Covid.
