The 50s Housewife Does Christmas

The post office is still goofing with me, but the show must go on! Despite not having a few things that would make our 1950s Christmas perfect, I'll do my best to offer you a glimpse of how the holiday was celebrated back in the day.

Unlike my previous 50s Housewife Experiments, I won't be yapping about what we're eating morning, noon and night but will instead tackle various Christmas-related projects like crafts, decorating, holiday wrapping, special treats and entertaining.

Because my timing got buggy, some of this has actually already happened, I just haven't told you about it yet. I'll be doing "real time" projects on the blog, too. All will be revealed this week.

I'm using a few different resources for this project, mainly late-1950s magazines, holiday-centric cookbooks and even a few commercials and TV shows from the time. Where possible, I've acquired the actual vintage items used - in other occasions, I've made items similar to what I've seen in magazines. Naturally, I also went out and purchased a few new things - but you'd be surprised how many Made in China items at today's dollar stores look a lot like 1950s-era Christmas crap.

From what I've read, the perfect 1950s Christmas:

• Is detail-oriented - it's all about the little touches
• Is colourful (from decor to enough food dye to make every trip to the bathroom a surprise)
• Is highly flammable
• Is cancer and / or diabetes-causing
• Presents an obvious danger to small children, pets and idiots
• Is confusing and / or ridiculous
• Climaxes with the little woman getting a cleaning apparatus as a gift

See what I mean about that last point? These were all from the same 1959 Better Homes and Gardens magazine:

Look at how excited this little girl is to get a towel set. Geez, you'd think she just received a Bissell Little Queen Housekeeping Set:

And here's a couple commercials thrown in for good measure:


This one is quite bizarre. First, it's the woman begging for the appliance; second, the man says he loves mincemeat pies (UGH); and third, he's smoking in the appliance store. Where does he think he is, Montreal?


I've told Patrick that although I'm dedicated to a 50s Christmas, he really need not buy me a fridge or vacuum or any other divorce-worthy present this year. Diamonds will do just fine.

Check back - more will be updated as I go:

Getting Into The Spirit of Things

More 50s Darlings and Disasters

50s Christmas: Everything is Aluminumated

The 1950s Christmas Cocktail Party