What was your favourite childhood Christmas decoration, and why?
Our cat Goliath had a fetish for silken baubles and would go to great lengths to grab one – bringing down the whole tree if need be – a source of merry mayhem for us youngsters.
R M Fransson, Wheat Ridge, Colorado, US
• Growing up in Sweden, it was all those small Swedish flags on Christmas trees. We had arrived after the war as Estonian refugees and those small flags became symbols of peace and freedom. We continued with the flags even after we had emigrated to Canada.
Reiner Jaakson, Oakville, Ontario, Canada
• The Christmas elf that was nestled in the branches of the Christmas tree.
Ann Scarfe, Victoria, British Columbia, Canada
• The delicate coloured glass balls on the large, front-room-filling spruce Christmas tree, selected for perfection by my farmworker father.
Steve Thomas, Yarralumla, ACT, Australia
• Snow, snow, heaps of snow!
David Tucker, Halle, Germany
• The empty pillow slip on the end of my bed on Christmas Eve, ready for Santa Claus.
Ted Webber, Buderim, Queensland, Australia
• Unquestionably the real candles on the Christmas tree in our living room with the lights out. How the house didn’t burn down I never fathomed. Perhaps the magic was working both ways!
Martin London, Christchurch, New Zealand
• The now bedraggled-looking star that has always decorated our Christmas tree and that I remember being placed there since I was a very young child. It’s now at a minimum of 75 years old and, before they flew the coop, was enjoyed by our children as well.
As to why, I can only attribute it to the emotionally charged atmosphere a young child experiences when confronted with the Christmas gifts piled at the base of the tree; put another way, childhood avarice cannot be discounted.
Terence Rowell, Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, Canada
• The Christmas tree – when we eventually got one! Our house in Wales was very small, too small for a tree apparently, but all the Christmas cards we received showed beautifully decorated trees and it seemed to me a tree was an essential “decoration” for the special season. The trees we eventually had were live but small enough to be put on a table.
Each year the tree was not decorated until a day or two before Christmas. This increased the magic – and excitement – for me. The fairy we put on the top of the tree, which was finally pensioned off when she became too dusty and creased, was my second-favourite decoration.
Avril Taylor, Dundas, Ontario, Canada
• The coloured strips that you made into circles and then chains; when the grandparents came around you proudly stated “I did that”.
Rhys Winterburn, Perth, Western Australia
• A very small model Christmas tree – because it sat in the centre of the icing on what appeared to be a huge Christmas cake.
Philip Stigger, Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada
• A present, because it was something I wanted.
Edward P Wolfers, Austinmer, NSW, Australia
• Mine reminds me of the early adult years my husband and I spent in tropical Papua New Guinea – a glass ornament of a gekko on a papaya.
Christine Hendriksen, Basel, Switzerland
• The tiny robin sitting on a spring on a tiny log, which stayed on our Christmas log until the last slice. This was in the late 1940s.
Tom Priestly, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada
• Countless strands of tinsel, each one lovingly hung by my five older sisters on a huge lighted tree.
Richard Orlando, Westmount, Quebec, Canada
• Those many-coloured gummed slips that one used to place between the tongue and the lip, lick, stick in a ring, forming a long linked chain with which to deck the halls. Because idle hands are the devil’s workshop and idle lips his mouthpiece; and I liked the gum flavour.
Anthony Walter, Surrey, British Columbia, Canada
• The tree; the smell.
Charlie Pearson, Portland, Oregon, US
• We had little candles in holders that clipped on to the branches of the Christmas tree. Unlit candles on a Christmas tree made no sense to my young self, but fortunately I failed to set either the tree or the house on fire.
Margaret Wyeth, Victoria, British Columbia, Canada
• My twin brother and I connived to depose the smug little angel on the top of the tree. To us, the rest of the decorations were mere baubles.
David Isaacs, Sydney, Australia
• My Danish advent wreath (Jule Krans), with its hand-made ring of evergreen sprigs, red bows and four candles, one of which was lit each of the four Sundays before Christmas, giving a gradual crescendo of expectation before the big night of December 24th.
Heddi Lersey, Surrey, British Columbia, Canada
• Paper chains. Made with strips of coloured paper, and a paste of flour and water. Kept us kids quiet and out of mum’s hair for a couple of hours.
Avril Nicholas, Crafers, South Australia
• My Father Christmas doll, made by my much loved Granny over 70 years ago. He rides a wooden reindeer pulling a wooden sledge with a small log on it, made by my Great Uncle. They are displayed on a cotton wool (snow). They bring back long ago memories of the people I loved and the cold English winters I still miss so much.
Jenefer Warwick James, Paddington, NSW, Australia
Any answers?
How many problems can you really have?
R De Braganza, Kilifi, Kenya
These days, name-calling is rife. What’s the most accurate epithet going? The funniest?
Donna Samoyloff, Toronto, Canada
Send answers and more questions to weekly.nandq@theguardian.com
