Five generations of one family are gathering to celebrate the festivities together, sparking memories of Christmases gone by.
Margaret Heyder, 96, will spend the day with her daughter Ingrid Kenhard, 75, grand-daughter Sonia Ross, 55, great-grand-daughter Rosie Forrester, 29, and great-great-grand-daughter Daisy Mann, two.
Margaret, also known as Granny Peggy, will enjoy the usual modern traditions with her family at her home on the outskirts of Monifieth, from stockings and presents to sharing a turkey dinner.
But it’s a far cry from the family Christmases Margaret remembers from her own youth in the 1920s.
As one of nine children, seven of which were boys, she said: “Two of my brothers went out to work on the railways. They left at 6am and didn’t get back until 6pm.
“The younger ones hung stockings up but they were just the stockings you wear, we didn’t have nice ones like you have now.
“The was no very much in them, an orange, a sugar moose (mouse), maybe another wee thing.”
Margaret, whose father worked on the land at a farm in the Borders when she was a child, says the family did not have the money for extravagant festive celebrations.
Her mother would make a home cooked meal, similar to what she did every day, and there wasn’t a Christmas tree or decorations in the family home.
“My dad worked for four pound ten (shillings) a week. We didn’t have a ha’penny,” she said.
When Christmas became Christmas
It was only when Margaret got her own house with her then husband, Werner Heyder, that she put up her first Christmas tree.
German-native Werner was a prisoner of war in WWII and was held at the farm where Margaret’s father worked, along with some other German soldiers.
She says you “weren’t supposed to talk to them” but her mother would send her out with some toast and Werner would chat to her.
A romance blossomed between the pair, but they had to wait until the end of the war and for Margaret to reach the age of 21 in 1948 before they could marry.
Moving to Dundee
The couple moved into a home on Seafield Road, in Dundee, and Werner took up a job as a glassblower.
Margaret said: “Once we had our own house, then Christmas was Christmas. We did decorations, a tree and stockings for all the wee ones.
“Werner loved Christmas. He would sing German carols and he learned all the English ones as well.
“We would have a homemade Christmas meal with soup, turkey and sherry trifle.”
Margaret and Werner, who passed away ten years ago, had five children together, who went on to produce 15 grandchildren.
And Margaret now has 30 great-grandchildren and two great-great-grandchildren and enjoys celebrating with them over the festive period.
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