OK, it's June, but this is a thread on the 'Christmas' topic. When you were a child, which one thing was your Christmas Memory

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Just reading about Magneto and her long lusted after Cinderella Carriage Lights that had all the childhood Christmas memories.

For me ,it was those little Angel Chimes.
The little gold candle holder with the fiddly,put together gold stem. The angels hang from this holding a little gold rod which goes ting,ting,ting on the bell. There's a little gold propellor that twists from the heat of the candle flame.
When I was a child, it was magical. (Probably, looking back without the rose tinted specs it was one of the very few Christmas decorations that my mother put up) I remember the smell of the candle wax too.

Fast forward a few years and I bought a set from a little shop in York called "Christmas Angels".
Only faff was finding the slender little candles to replace, and keeping it safe from DC. But the tinny little twinkling sound takes me back years.
Aaaahhh!

Ahh that's lovely.

Tangerines wrapped in purple/lilac tissue paper. My dad used to buy our fruit from a fruit market on his way home from work. At Christmas he'd get wrapped ones (don't ask me why they wrapped them up). Even now just the smell of a tangerine reminds me of Christmas. I had competitions with my sister to see who could peel them in one piece.

Also the taste of advocaat reminds me of sitting watching all the usual Christmas films - Sound of Music, Wizard of Oz.

I love Christmas

Angel chimes, yes.

Advocaat, yes.

the rustle and weight of waking to my stocking resting at the end of my bed.

Carols.

I love Christmas too. It's got it's magic back now we have children of our own.

The smell of a real christmas tree.

ExP HATED real ones so I never got the chance to get a real one. The first christmas after he left I got 1. A huge, 8 ft, really bushy tree that was nearly as good as the trees you see in the christmas movies. It was worth every, single penny and I'm going to do it again, every year from now on.

Forgot to mention...

as I grew up, getting a fake tree was unheard of in my family. I didn't know anyone who had one.

Oh I love carols too. I used to sing in my church choir as a child/teenager and loved Midnight Mass. Once in Royal David's City still brings tears to my eyes. I love going to the DCs Nativity Plays - there is nothing like Away in a Manger sung by a 5yo to start the season of goodwill.

I think part of the reason I love Christmas is because my dad loved it so much and my memories are not so much of gifts but of family meals, all going to Midnight Mass, watching TV together, playing board games with my sisters etc. I'm trying to pass that on to my DCs - not the material side.

I listen to an internet radio station called 1.FM Always Christmas when I am on my own, It reminds me so much of Christmas when I was a child.

I bought a scented candle from M & S a few years ago called "Frankincense". It smells exactly like the box that we used to keep our Christmas decorations in when I was a child.

The smell of oranges and Christmas trees and cinnamon.

Aww how lovely, I opened this thread to tell anyone who cares who hasn't heard already about my magical christmas lights [grins]

my mum used to sometimes put multi coloured lights on the tree and I would pretend I was telling the weather using them.

Red was hot, blue rain and green storms! I loved it.

xmas for me is the tree, lights, food and excitement

We had the Angel Chimes too and last year I found a set in a little candle shop so now my babies will have the same memory.

My best memories of christmas are:

My brother [but don't tell him .
The family christmas party at my Great Nan's pub and 100's of cousins.
Decorating the tree with my brother and the playing under it with his toy cars.
Nuts, still in their shells.

I have two, standing on my sindy 4-poster and breaking it before I unwrapped it and my mum going nuclear, and Christmas lunch about two hours after my aunt and uncle decided to get divorced. I'm working hard on some better memories for my kids

What a lovely thread idea :) I don't really have anything to add as on the whole my Xmases were crap but it is really nice to see what others remember - inspires me to create better Xmases for my own DCs.

Definitely the lights on the tree. Especially on the evenings when all lights were turned off except the fairy lights and the shadows up the wall were all spiky with multicoloured layers - completely magical.

When I was a child any hint of multicoloured lights would set off that 'xmas' feeling. I don't get it any more, but I still remember how it felt, and would give anything to get it back

I think lights are so christmassy, there is a large street near us which does charity light displays, yes they are naff and environmentally dodgy, but our two love driving up to have a peek.

Decorating the house - I always loved doing this at the time, and it amuses me to look back on because my parents had a mixture of beautiful, classy stuff, and utterly tacky tat. As I grew up I gained taste and banned the tat, so now it's just a memory :)

Driving to my grandparents' house and knowing I was going to see all my family and get presents

Best memories, waking up obscenely early and opening our stockings in bed with my brother at nan and grandads house. Listening to junior choice on the radio, waiting until we could open our presents, the smell of nans lunch cooking, all sat round table and grandad telling funny jokes. Crates of fruit, boxes of dates and quality street put out on the side to nibble on. coloured lights on the christmas tree, and those foil decorations that used to hang from the ceiling. Learning all the carols by heart to sing in school concert and also in the, local nursing homes. Was just mum, me and my brother (and gps) when I was growing up but we always had fab christmases, I still love it to this day.

Now have children of my own, I try and recreate the excitement of it all for them - without those 70s decorations! And its my turn to host nan and grandad and look after them. Grandad still tells the same jokes though .

Oh I wish it was december!

The giant teddy bear we always used to get at christmas. Done something similar with DD, as every year Father Christmas brings her the House of Fraser bear with the year embroidered on it's foot- they are all lined up on shelves in her room.

I also remember always getting those fake silky pjs as a kid.