Old, Vintage & Antique Christmas Items

Do you remember the "joys" of lights that all went out when one bulb burned out?

Many of these old Christmas ornaments and decorations were hand made.  Finding them on Ebay can bring back lots of memories, provide a way to teach children about how things were done in your childhood and be fun to collect in their own right.  Done with skill, it might even be an investment.

We hosted a German Exchange student from near Dresden and he brought with him many Christmas taditions we were not familiar with.  In particular, Smokers, Nutcrackers and Erzgebirge items .  It was en eye-opener to learn that some food and other family traditions were actually much more widespread than just in our family.  We had unknowingly carried on some cultural traditions thinking they were just the way we did things.