On the 8th day of ...

We bought the tree a week ago, and managed to get lights on it yesterday. That, of course, was a production, because half of one string was out and although we fiddled with all of the bulbs and replaced the teeny tiny fuses, nothing worked and so we had to trot off to the hardware store. (Before we threw the bad string out, I pulled all of the bulbs out of the good half, in case I need them next year.)

It was almost like a reprise of last weekend, when half of one string for the outside garland turned up kaput and we had to go to the hardware store and then come home and rebuild the garland that we'd fabricated with measured rope and fixed hanging points (and lights and fake evergreens) so it would be easy to put up over the front door. Easy ... until the lights don't work.

What is with these light strings where half works and half doesn’t?

Anyway, I finally got the ornaments on the tree today.

Unpacking the ornaments is always an exercise in nostalgia. There are boxes and boxes of ornaments, including boxes that have my grandmother's handwriting, and probably date to the 1940s.

What's in the box isn't necessarily what she's written. But that bell in the middle of the bottom row? That was definitely her bell.

My mother stored tiny glass ornaments in egg cartons. I once took a Bloomingdale's gift box (back when gift boxes were sturdy and worth keeping) and made dividers out of shirt cardboard. At this point, I think that box is 30 years old.

I do still need to address the mantle, and vacuum up the needles, and install the skirt, so no tree picture. Yet.