Advent Calendar of Christmas Memories 2010 - Christmas Cards - December 4

Each year my family would send and receive a modest number of Christmas cards. The cards that we received would be displayed on whatever surface was available, usually starting with the top of the television. Now there's something I will have to explain to my children! Yes, once upon a time, back in the olden days, televisions were housed in wooden boxes that could be used as a surface for decorative items.

Along with the Christmas cards we would receive a few photocopied family newsletters packed with information about their activities for the year. We would hear about academic or sporting successes, career successes or failures, medical procedures, new relationships and breakups. We would wonder how widely they were distributing this sometimes very personal information!

There's something else I should add to my list of things to ask Dad about - do we have a stash of those old Christmas newsletters our relatives used to send? Genealogically, they're a treasure trove.

This post is part of the Advent Calendar of Christmas Memories, hosted by Geneabloggers.