Sunday, December 16, 2007

Christmas Candy - Advent Calendar of Christmas Memories


December 7 - Christmas Candy - Christmas Grab Bag





One thing I miss sometimes about Christmas is the colourful ‘hard candy’ that used to be in a dish on every side table, especially the little candies with flower patterns inside (however do they do that?) and the ribbon candy. There are still candy canes now, even blueberry flavoured ones (why?), but candy's just not the same.

I was just at the store yesterday. There was so much candy there, but I noticed that almost everything was ‘chocolate’. I never was much for chocolate myself, although I remember both being given and giving boxes of chocolate cherries. Too sweet for me now (in the original meaning, and now I’m concerned about ‘fair trade’ too). Sometimes we had shaped marzipan – like tiny bells and other ornaments –and candied ginger, still one of my favourite sweets. We used to get that from one of my Dad’s friends, or buy it in Vancouver’s Chinatown. Now I can get candied ginger all year round at my nearest grocery store. That’s a very good change, I feel.

This card was from my ‘Aunt Mary’ on my 6th birthday. (She wasn’t my aunt – but that’s another story.) It’s a cute card –the candy cane has sparkly sprinkles on it – it says ‘This bunny brought along his “lunch” So that he could stay And wish you “Happy Birthday’. Unfortunately it illustrates one of the few things that annoyed me about Christmas as a kid. It was way too close to both my brother’s and my birthdays!

My thrifty parents, thinking to teach us money management, sometimes had us save up to go halves on more expensive presents, like the Brownie camera I got one year which was for Christmas and my birthday. Really this just ticked me off, especially as my friends got loads of presents on Christmas and for their birthdays ‘cause they had so many more relatives than we did. (My brother has just told me that he remembers “YOU always getting more presents than me” but I’m real sure that can’t have been true, little brother. )

Click on December 7 to read a variety of Christmas memories from other bloggers: http://destinationaustinfamily.blogspot.com




No comments: