Readers share memories of Christmas past

We asked readers to share their memories of Christmas. Here’s what they said:

Guessing game

My memorable Christmas memory is when my grandparents came for Christmas dinner and after we all ate, we would have “Guessers,” where we would purchase a gift for everyone that was under $1, wrapped in used gift wrap and had a tag made from an old card. We were not allowed to open it until we guessed what was inside. My family has continued this tradition for over 50 years.

Lori Reiner

Weatherly

The Christmas experience

I don’t have a particular memory, but rather the same memories for every Christmas.

Growing up in South Whitehall Township in Lehigh County, our home was always beautifully decorated in a tasteful manner. People would actually slow down and stop to admire the decorations.

We always went to the 11 p.m. church service on Christmas Eve. The hardest part was trying to stay awake.

If there were too many people to fit around the dining room table, my parents would set up picnic tables in the recreation room. People would sit wherever they could find a seat. The dinner would be served buffet-style. If somebody had no place to go on Christmas, they would always be welcome.

After writing my Christmas letter to Santa Claus, my mother would take me to visit Santa at Hess’s in Allentown. There were no empty spaces under the tree on Christmas.

My annual Christmas wish is for all children to have the same experience.

Richard Ochs

Lehigh Township

Tough times

One Christmas, my parents wanted to teach their daughters a valuable lesson on the meaning of Christmas.

Our grandfather had just had surgery and times were tough. Our grandparents weren’t able to give gifts to their eight children and numerous grandchildren. My parents decided to help my grandparents, so they had gifts to present to the entire family.

Our parents sat all three of us down and explained the situation and that we wouldn’t be able to get a lot of presents.

When we opened our gifts, we each received one super-ball, and ten 10-penny nails.

We were grateful, and began playing jacks with them together on the floor. After a while, we asked our father if it was possible to have just a few more nails.

Dad told Mom to go down to the basement to grant us our request. As Mom came up from the basement, she was carrying a garbage bag full of gifts.

Unbeknown to my sisters and I, we ended up showing our parents that they were raising some pretty good kids.

Kimberly Williams

Palmerton

Cutting down the tree

It was 1956 that we still had not gotten our Christmas tree. Since it was the week before Christmas — I was given the job of asking my Dad when we were getting our tree.

He happened to be in Grinch mode when I asked. I was blown away by his answer. If you want a tree, you damn well better get it yourself.

Whoa!

I didn’t know what to do. I was shocked by his sharp words. We were not within distance of a tree farm, so what should we do?

We all thought about it and came up with a plan. We’d get our tree.

Now this was going on about five days prior to Christmas. We were home on holiday when we had asked. So that day, we got our plan together.

There were “scrub” pines growing down in the back of or house. Now a “scrub” pine isn’t a very pretty tree — like the spruce or hemlock to name a few. However, we decided that it would be our Christmas tree.

We waited until Dad had gone to work, and then we began to put our plan into action.

We knew we would need a saw, so I was sent into Dad’s workshop to get one of his. I picked the shiniest and the sharpest one I could find. I called to my siblings that we could go for our tree now. Our “mission” finished, I returned the saw to the exact place I had gotten it.

After getting the tree into the living room, we proceeded to string popcorn, gather the lights, cotton and collect all the balls, we could find to trim our “scrub” pine tree. One of the things we noticed was that the tree already had pine cones on it. It gave such a pretty effect to this tree.

It was quite sticky though to hang all the ornaments — because that’s a scrub pine.

Well, we had almost finished doing our business with our tree when Dad came home from work. We pretended not to notice his presence and went on putting the skirt on and the town layout around. We chuckled to ourselves.

Suddenly Dad asked loudly, “Where did you kids get that tree?”

We turned to look at him and his face was red. You know the kind when someone is angry! We told him down in the back.

“And how did you get it?” he roared.

“We walked down and cut it down with one of your saws,” was our answer.

“Who cut it down with my saw?” again roaring.

I raised my hand, shivering in my shoes, “I did.”

“Do you know that I just bought that saw?” he said, more calm than before.

“Dad, we didn’t know that was a new saw, but you did tell us if we wanted a tree, we’d have to get it. So we did!”

For a minute, which seemed like forever, there was dead silence.

Then suddenly Mom came into the living room. She had heard what was going on and said, “I remember when they asked you about a tree, I remember what you said and that’s just what they did!”

I will say at this we started giggling and then laughing so hard — even Dad!

Kay Schnell

Lehighton

Ghost of Christmas past

Many years after the fact I learned a story about my father and the Christmas of 1949. That was the year I awoke on Christmas morning to find a shiny red pedal fire engine complete with ladders and a bell under the tree! I have a photo of the event and I still have the fire engine, but I don’t have any memory of that day except for the one that really counts.

Life was tough for so many in the years following World War II, and life for my parents fit that description quite well. My Dad saw that fire engine in the front display window of Greenberger’s store, the forerunner of Silver’s, in Lansford a few weeks before Christmas, but it was priced, as were so many things, way out of range.

Not one to give up, Dad learned toys would go on sale Christmas Eve just before the store closed, and so he stood in front of that store and waited. Do you recall the “It was a dark and stormy night” introduction to many stories? Well, it was and cold, too! As advertised, the sticker prices were slashed about an hour before closing, and Dad made his way into the crowded store and bought that fire engine for me. Me!

Thanks, Dad. I didn’t forget, and I never will.

Joe Nihen

Lansford