Decorating Hiatus

Sandy Rettschlag

3 years ago

I love Christmas decorations. If I could do nothing else it would be to decorate for Christmas. I love trying to come up with different ideas for decorating from year to year.

It’s at this time of the year that I would love an all-white house so that I could experiment with different colors and different themes. Now, I do believe less is more, and can’t stand big artificial plastic guys. I like pretty, sparkly, shiny, decorations placed strategically around to accent those empty spaces.

Due to a hospital stay, I had to rethink my strategy for decorating. At first, I was going to let the decorating just go by the wayside. This would have been a first for me. But, as I got my strength back I decided on the theory “less is more”. I decorated the bare minimum and found it to be rather invigorating. I actually allowed myself not to believe everything had to be perfect. This resulted in one very simple tree versus four, minimal décor on all the floors of my house, and I actually find it o.k. Of course, it helped that my youngest daughter held Christmas since she had a beautiful house. I brought the main course, and it was one of my best Christmases ever. I had my whole family with me. Who could ask for more?

Now, in the past, I am probably one of the last people on the earth to take their decorations down. I guess I love how they make me feel, and the cozy atmosphere that they create. I just don’t want to take them down. It takes me a while to put them up. I don’t like to put Christmas decorations up until the day after Thanksgiving. But, that’s when all the fun open houses, tour of homes, concerts, and holiday celebrations start and I just don’t want to miss those events. That definitely puts me behind and I find I am doing my decorating late. So, now Christmas is here, and I find it so depressing to actually see some people putting their beautiful, still fresh, Christmas trees to the curb. This just feels wrong. The end of the holidays in my estimation is January 6th. I have actually been known to leave my decorations up until say the end of January, the first part of February, or maybe later, who cares??? Of course, with artificial trees, this can be done and that is why I have made the change instead of a fresh tree.

I guess I take the hint that it is time to take down the Christmas decorations when my husband starts shutting the drapes so that the world doesn’t think we are totally messed up.

My family is the best Christmas decoration I could have.