Christmas Until EasterSidetracked Sisters

I always struggle with when to take down my Christmas decorations. I’m not the type of person that puts everything up the day after Thanksgiving.

I usually try to wait until at least December has started. I’m also strongly against taking them down on December 26th as so many people do as I’ve just got them all up and the house is looking very festive and cozy.

It usually takes a week or so to put up all my Christmas decorations and the thought of taking them down immediately after the holiday just seems pointless. Why not enjoy them for a while longer? I think taking them down in the middle of January sounds reasonable. My dilemma comes at this point. With Christmas as the goal of getting my decorating done, what is my goal for getting them put away?

There is no holiday until Easter that is dependent upon my house looking like Better Homes & Gardens, so the Christmas decorations seem to linger longer than they should.

One year, I believe I had my decorations up until somewhere in March. It had gone past the time when the garbage men would pick up the trees on the side of the road, so I had to launch the dried-up tree into the backyard. Once spring came, the 12’ tree was still in my yard. My next-door neighbor was having some tree work done and the guys needed to come thru my yard. I told them that they could on one condition… they had to get rid of my Christmas tree. They did so willingly and went about their business. I felt very proud of myself for finding a way to rid my yard of the problem.

Last year, I found myself again past the time to have the garbage men take my tree, so I proceeded to bring in the hedge trimmer and cut the branches off the tree one by one. I then took the trunk and heaved it out into the backyard. When spring came, I cut up the trunk and used it for firewood. It made a much smaller mess than trying to wedge a 12’ dried-up pine tree thru multiple doorways!

This year, even if the rest of my decorations stay up longer, that’s fine, but I’ll try to make the garbage men’s deadline for picking up the tree. As long as I don’t have to hide the Easter eggs amongst the nativity scenes, I think I’ll be in good shape.