Last week we added a little Christmas cheer to the front exterior of the house with some pretty white Christmas lights. Despite the uninhabitable interior, we wanted to still be a part of the festivities of the neighbourhood. Since then, I have been thinking a lot about what the first Christmas in the home would have been like for John A McD....d and his family (who was the first home-owner, according to the smudged historical land registry documents). What I discovered was interesting. Our house, as you know from past blog posts, is a Victorian, so it was built in the reign of Queen Victoria. Queen Victoria's husband Prince Albert is actually credited for starting many of the traditions that we associate today with Christmas. For instance, he was the one who made it fashionable for families to decorate trees at this time of year. As a German, Prince Albert grew up with the evergreen tree as an important symbol of renewal and hope during the winter season; however, it was never tied to Christmas until he decided to commission a picture of the royal family around the tree in 1848. With this picture, he also gave the holiday more of a focus on family and children. Prior to this time, children were viewed as miniature adults, and had virtually no rights when it came to labour and basic care. Because of the new ideas about childhood and parenting, Christmas became more of a social holiday that everyone could be a part of. It is likely that in its first year, our house would have been adorned with evergreen boughs, holly, and mistletoe. According to my findings, mistletoe was brought into fashion as Christmas decor by the Victorians, who hung it from the ceiling and began its kissing ritual. Victorians had a rule that no longer exists for us though, where every time a kiss was had under the plant, a berry had to be plucked from it. Once the berries were all gone, there was no more kissing! The idea of gift giving and feasting was always present at Christmas-time, but there was definitely a commercialization of the season in the 19th century. Traditionally smaller gifts of nuts, candy, and homemade things shifted to more store-bought toys and games in many of the homes of middle class families. It is important to note that we often romanticize the Victorian Christmas, but there were huge class divides at this time, economically and socially. Labour laws were minimal, as were basic living standards. We see Victorian images of a warm fire and a Christmas tree with heaps of presents beneath it, but appearances are deceiving. Not unlike our modern day tendency to distort reality through photos, society presented itself in an idealized version that was not necessarily one of truth. I will wrap up this blog post by highlighting one last tradition started in the glory days of our house, which is Christmas card giving. I am a fan of snail mail and have been excited about the Christmas cards that have been coming to Kyle and my own post-office box :). Thank you to those who have sent us holiday mail, and to friends who usually receive some snail mail love from me at this time of year, check your own mail-boxes-- it is coming for you! *An Extra: Boxing Day was a holiday started by Victorians as a day when wealthier families would give their servants and workers boxes of little presents. Poorer, working class families were more likely to stick to the older, simpler gift giving of nuts and candies, so this would have been special, and maybe akin to a Christmas bonus?!
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About MeKyle and I just became new homeowners. The house we purchased is not what one would classify as "move in ready"; in fact, it is quite the opposite. Built at the turn of the 20th century, our Victorian style house is both beautiful and terrifying in its ancient status and will be a project in renovation. This is a documentation of our triumphs and lessons learned, as we deconstruct and reconstruct this house. The end result? A space that we can proudly say we created. Archives
December 2016
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