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about holiday dressing-too early but

always trying

Veteran

For several years the Christmas sweaters were seen everywhere. we wore the sweaters and sweatshirts from Thanksgiving to New Years. Then someone decided they were UGLY..Who? Clinton? Then someone started the ugly Christmas party stuff, and the old sweaters were fetching big bucks on E-bay, etc. So people were paying lotsa money for UGLY. Now I am seeing some of these sweaters showing up new for reasonable prices. Is it because they are no longer ugly, or are they now fashionable, or is it just a less expensive way to dress for the "ugly Christmas party? Who decides things like what is "ugly"? Why do people not decide for themselves what is ugly or not to them?

guess it is the right person on TV or something starting things like fruitcakes being "non edible-jokes, or whatever. I guess it was Johnny Carson who told the world about fruitcakes. For many decades they were considered wonderful Christmas treats. When I was growing up a neighbor make them for her neighbors. They were delightful. Then my mom ordered them from somewhere, I think Texas, for years. We had them throught the holidays and never once heard a negative thing about them. After mom passed away I started making fruictakes for us, but now we do not offer them to others. Agreed some are not good, but definitely not all--and I have family members and friends who love good fruitcake..

Dressing

25 replies

Latest reply was from anne

K. Period.

Veteran

FWIW, I love fruitcake, even the bad ones with too many candied fruits.

I don't love the Christmas sweaters, and honestly I do consider them ugly. For me, they are lumped in with Disney character sweatshirts and holiday pins that play Christmas carols. They are too precious for me and they are too one-purpose wear. They don't have any beauty on their own as a piece of apparel. (Snowflake pattern, handknit Nordic sweater? Love. Ho Ho Ho sweater, not so much.) Most Christmas sweaters only have usefulness to communicate a message that "I love this holiday!" That isn't appealing to me. But that's my opinion. It is an opinion shared by many, but just an opinion. That's all that fashion is--a game of shared opinions exercised enmass.

Sometimes we like things that lots of other people don't (fruitcake). We can choose to enjoy it anyhow and wink at the jokes. Or you can be steamed that other people won't like it. There is always a bit of judgment in fashion--what is in fashion, what is not in fashion, what is cool on you, but not cool on me, what is cutting-edge soon to be cool, what is faded, overdone no longer cool. It is all part of the game. You control this. You decide how deeply you want to engage in the fashion game, and what you let bother you. Anyone judging me because my Sam Edelman booties are a Gucci knock off or my random brand x jeans are from last year can go take a leap. I'm not playing the game at that level. To extend your analogy: No one can make me hate fruitcake!

If you want to wear a holiday sweater and will enjoy it, do! And really enjoy it! At the end of the day, it is just a game.

ETA: Also, I think the reason you are seeing them commonly and inexpensively available now is because the trend of people having "ugly Christmas sweater" parties has really taken off lately and become very common. That means that manufacturers now have enough of a market to make a profit, and where a profit can be made....

JAileen

Veteran

Corsicana is famous for its fruitcake factory. A neighbor of my grandmother always gave her a homemade one with sweetened condensed milk and little if any flour. It was really delicious. I wish I had the recipe.

I think the ugly sweaters are acrylic with Santa Claus and the like, on them.

I have several patterned sweaters that I think are gorgeous. They are traditional Norwegian sweaters, handknit, of wool, in traditional colors and patterns. I bought them at thrift stores for under $5 each.
My son wanted to wear #1 to an ugly sweater party. I refused him. Because it's not ugly!

Today I happen to be wearing a Dale of Norway sweater. It is not handknit. I paid $2 for it. We're having a cold snap and it's very warm. While it's not my favorite sweater, I still don't think it's ugly!

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rachylou

Veteran

Did Bridget Jones start the ugly Christmas sweater thing? Anyways, they're still ugly, but Ok now because now they can be worn with irony...

K. Period.

Veteran

JAileen, I so want your sweaters #2 and #3! They remind me of a beautiful old sweater (my mom's first boyfriend's) that I wore when I was a teenager. Lovely!

JAileen

Veteran

K.Period, thank you! I'm glad someone else thinks they're beautiful. I think #2 is my favorite with the tiny reindeer around the hem.

catgirl

Veteran

K. Period hit the nail on the head. Myself, I love Christmas and all the decorating and bling I can cram into it. As for the sweaters, if they give you joy, wear them. I wear lots of things that other people dislike or find unfeminine (stompy boots, ripped jeans, skulls) and I can live with that.

plonkee

Christmas jumpers have been very in for a few years in the UK (and they were out my whole adult life before). I think they're being worn mostly ironically, but their increase in popularity is at the same time as for example Christmas themed bedding which is generally quite tasteful.

I have one Christmas sweater and may buy another but they are reserved for time spent celebrating Christmas, or Christmas jumper day for charity. I wouldn't wear them on say a regular dress down Friday at work in December.

Murph11

Veteran

I'll happily eat fruitcake WEARING a Christmas sweater, thank you very much!

Angie

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Fashion Stylist

I love a good fruit cake. My Mama would make Christmas stollen - Dutch Xmas bread - for people at Xmas time. I love these traditions.

As for the Xmas Sweater, I echo what K. Period said.

Anonymous

I'm not sure how President Clinton got involved in this, but I'm sure he'd be all for you wearing one of these sweaters if you really wanted to. He might even wear one himself. Hillary? Probably not.

always trying

Veteran

By clinton I meant the clonton -what not to wear one...

Yeh for fruitcake..I may even offer it along with the cookies to christmas guests this year,,but then that would be less for DH and I.

I wore my Christmas embellished sweaters in the 90's, but not since.. Think I may have one put away somewhere. I saw a couple of cute ones as I was searching for a poncho, but think I will go with just getting something like red that I can wear all winter. Want to get something new to wear to a casual Christmas party.

Carla

Veteran

If there is fruit cake - I'm in! Holiday sweaters...not so much. I prefer a bit of subtlety in my holiday apparel. I also don't like to embark on the holiday decor too early - December 1 is the start date. That is when the wreath goes on the door, the Christmas cards get mailed out, and the weekly baking gets ratcheted up from chocolate chip or peanut butter cookies to gingerbread cookies, holiday spice cookies, sugar cookies, or empire cakes.

Red, green, maybe a little shine or bling in daily outfits. I do like a seasonal pin on my winter coat but opt for winter themes like snowflakes, or a snowman, or a stylized reindeer.

*Angie* seasonal dressing would be an interesting topic to tackle in a future blog post - after US Thanksgiving!

Jjsloane

Veteran

I love to theme dress for fun (first rule of YLF right?) I like the idea of the "ugly christmas sweater" (some more obvious than others) as a fun item to wear in support of the spirit of the holiday similar to wearing a team jersey in support of a team. Not fashionable, but fun to wear. I do not consider the Dale of Norway styles posted as Ugly Christmas Sweaters. My interpretation is more most anything with a santa, reindeer or lights/sequins etc...

MsMaven

Veteran

My Mom made fabulous fruitcake. She started in October and it took a while for them to "idle" in the basement pantry. It breaks my heart that fruitcakes are so reviled--they never tasted my Mom's.

Arg, so it's late in the season to get going on my legacy recipes. I like all fruitcake, even the store-bought packaged ones.

Holiday sweaters? Another issue. Never had one, never will. To each her own.

Ginger

Veteran

I've had fruitcake once when I was little and LOVED it. I've also made a cake from an 18th century recipe that had a lot of similarities. I would love to make one! There's a lot of people mentioning lost recipes; I'm in the mood to try one, if you discover it!
JAileen, Corsicana? I wonder if that's where ours came from.

As for Christmas sweaters. In my mind, the "ugly" is associated with the home-made embellishment craze in the 80s and 90s: fabric yo-yos, angels, glitter paint, bedazzling, etc. It got crazy, with decorated hats, bags, jeans, everything - the definition of tacky, to today's eyes. At some point Fashion kind of shook itself and everything officially went black or solid for a long time. But there were plenty of people who did keep wearing the embellished and patterned stuff - incidentally the same generation who gave rise to the much-reviled "mom jeans" phenomenon. Christmas sweaters, as well as traditional highly-patterned sweaters, are guilty by association with all this.

Angie has shown very well how some trends can disappear, and then re-appear and feel fresh for their absence. Christmas sweaters and high waist jeans are not quite in that category, because they never were abandoned by a wide portion of the population. (Like cat-eye eyeglasses that show up in family photos for 20+ years past their heyday.) So now when these trends are brought up again, they're slower to catch on and plenty of people shun them.

Them's just my thoughts, of course!

Bijou

Veteran

Beautiful fairisle sweaters and good fruitcake are both classics to me. Unfortunately it is like most things that if they get mass produced cheaply, the copy is a poor substitute for the real thing. Well done Aileen on saving those beautiful sweaters. When Saint Laurent includes a fair isle sweater in the 2014 winter collection, you know wearing one is not in bad taste!

JAileen

Veteran

Here's a picture of a holiday sweater that I was given. My mother had it and thought I should have it. It just wasn't my style, though.

#1. My mother wearing the sweater.
#2 Why she thought I should have it!

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Aziraphale

Veteran

My awareness of the "ugly Christmas sweater" dates back to the 2001 release of Bridget Jones's Diary (the film). There is a funny scene involving Mark Darcy's Christmas-themed jumper (English word for sweater), which Bridget privately mocks. He's clearly uncomfortable wearing it but feels obliged to because it was a gift. This in turn relates to the time-honoured English tradition of being polite to a person's face, and freely making fun of them behind their back (a humour tactic shared by Canadians). I'm not sure if the ugly Christmas sweater meme is related to that movie, but that's when they suddenly appeared on my personal radar. Having said that, I've never been to an Ugly Sweater party. Also, my lovely American auntie still wears them every Christmas -- not ironically -- I do not make fun of her, even behind her back.

As for fruitcake, it was always something both my grandmothers made, but more for tradition's sake, since nobody seemed to like it very much. I'm all for tradition, but I've yet to come across a fruitcake recipe that suited my taste!

Dee

Veteran

Christmas sweaters fall under the category of theme clothing to me. They are so obviously associated with a specific I can't appreciate any other stylistic component. It's the same reason I don't buy shirts with city names on them when I travel, or theme park shirts. That said, I did own one for a holiday sweater party a few years ago. But I never wore it anywhere else.

I don't think I've ever actually had fruitcake before, so I will stay out of that debate.

Beth Ann

Veteran

In the early 90s, I had some lovely little Christmas tree flats -- black velvet, with embroidered trees on the toes. Yes, they would strike me as a tad too precious and thematic now, but I remember thoroughly enjoying them at the time!

I still do holiday dressing, though, I just avoid obvious "themes." However, don't know that I would enjoy an ugly sweater party much, because I'm more wary of hipster mockery than I am of being unfashionable. It seems to violate that WWJD wristband (which I also don't wear) and the meaning of the season.

Bonnie

Veteran

I went to a fun Ugly Christmas Sweater Party two years ago. All of the guests had taught at the same elementary school and in the late 80's we wore those funny holiday sweaters to amuse ourselves and our students. One of our fellow teachers actually kept hers and added more from thrift shops so when the Ugly Christmas Party fad became popular, she was stocked. She asked us beforehand if we'd be willing and we all agreed. At our annual Christmas Party, we all wore one for a group photo. As for fruitcake, DH loves Corsicana fruitcakes and orders a couple of them every year. I like them, too.

Echo

Veteran

My mum was a teacher, and for years before the movie being referenced here came out, we had referred to them as "teacher sweaters" because it seemed all the teachers wore funny holiday themed sweaters (and earrings).

I bought my sons Star Wars Christmas sweaters for the holidays this year. They are made to imitate the traditional '80's style, but are hilarious with Darth Vader with a scarf or a storm trooper with antlers.

Traditional Scandinavian sweaters are an entirely different category and are beautiful, IMO.

As for fruitcake, I've never had one. But if they were so awful, people would not continue to make and/or purchase them.

retailgirl

Veteran

I love fruitcake. My father worked for Continental Baking Company, ( Wonder Bread) and they had wonderful fruit cakes in tins that looked like Wedgwood. And when I got married, I had the top layer of my traditional three tiered cake be a fruitcake, to save for our first anniversary. As far as ugly Christmas sweaters go...I work in retail and like to look like I have the holiday spirit...even though I quite often do not. So I have a nice, tasteful and subtle collection of pins and scarves and I wear one every day between thanksgiving and Christmas. But no sweaters! My favorite pins are by Margaret Furlong, in white bisque china. She also makes beautiful angel ornaments, which make lovely secret Santa gifts or hostess gifts.

Sal

Veteran

I adore fruit cake, and fruit mince pies!! I have just made two for gifts and will make one more for us!

I find Christmas sweaters a little wasteful in general. You just won't get much use from them. But that could be my cultural norms speaking. Besides they are irrelevant in the Southern Hemisphere!

anne

Veteran

I don't like either fruit cake or fruit mince pies (as I don't like sultanas), but they are always elements in the Australian Christmas celebration. I'm glad that my families have generally moved on from Christmas puddings too. I have seen some berry flavoured mini mince pies that I might try.

Like AZ, Bridget Jones diary was my introduction to the holiday sweater idea - though I have certainly seen people wearing t shirts and earrings with Christmas theme. I just bring out my red sparkly special occasion tunic/dress