Vintage Christmas Decorations

My friend, Deanna, has this awesome Christmas Blog and she is totally the Queen of Vintage Christmases. If you want to see what was happening and what Christmas looked like the year Jim and I were born...check out this fun website for Shiny Brite Ornaments, etc. These little clips bring back so many memories for me. It is amazing but I can still remember the packaging of these items from the 40's. Very Nostalgic!

I remember having to painstakingly put them all back in the boxes and having to take the tinsel off one strand at a time to save for the next year. The ornaments were very thin glass and easily broken so we had to take special care of them. It was never as fun as putting the tree up of course. That is about the only thing that hasn't changed in the ensuing years!

I am glad that Deanna is so interested in this time way before she was born because it really brings me back to those bygone days in my own childhood. I am hopeful that our kids will find it interesting to look at things as they were in the good ole days! All these Shiny Brite products were available way into the 60's so this was my whole childhood basically. Everybody had them...and I do mean everybody! In those times there was not much variety in Christmas decor.

No one had a Santa collection or a snowman collection in those days. It was just after the war when things were taken off rationing and this is what was available to the households of America. They were thrilled just to be reunited with loved ones and to be able to light their Christmas trees again. It was simply enough.


Our friends had the bubble lites by the time the 50's rolled around and as kids we were always quite envious of that. And in our house though we were lucky too! We had this~a paste board nativity set that is the only tangible remnant of Christmas from when I was a little girl. It is a prized possession in my Christmas collection today.

The colors are still bright!

It has held up well considering it is just a heavy cardboard stable.

When Christmas is past you just fold up the part where the wise men and shepherd are and it is its own self-contained box for storage. It was pretty cleverly made really and probably cost about a dollar or two. Now, to me it is priceless. What do you treasure from Christmas as a child?