A bit sheepishly
A lot of times on Wednesdays, I end up writing a sort of in-depth post about something. But for the last few weeks, it's just been randomness.
And ummm....that's the case again today. I do have other posts in the offing, but they're not quite ready yet!
I de-Christmased my house
Yesterday I took my tree and the other Christmas decorations down and OOH I feel good.
I like Christmas decorations, but I also really, really love the feeling of having everything clean and tidy and back to normal.
To put things away, I had to go into the basement room that we call the boiler room, and my feet got SO dirty.
The boiler needs to have a cleaning service, because it's sending some sooty dust onto the floor in there and I clearly need to wear a pair of dedicated flip-flops when I enter, at least for now.
Sometimes Chiquita goes down there too and we can always tell because her feet get very dirty. 😉
My painted Christmas tree stand held up very well
My de-rusting and painting job did the trick because everything was still intact when I removed my tree yesterday. Yay!
In case you missed it, here's the run-down of what I did to rescue my rusty 1997 tree stand.
I bought a tube of caulk and regretted it.
You know how I'm painting that bookshelf white? Well, whenever you paint something a light color, there are inevitably little gaps that become visible and need caulking.
Sadly, my only tube of caulk had dried up.
So I went to Home Depot, got to the cash register, and discovered they don't take Apple Pay (I forgot my wallet at home!)
I put the caulk back, and later that afternoon I went to a local hardware store, this time WITH my wallet, and got a squeeze tube of caulk, mainly because I thought it would be handy to have the resealable tip.
But man, I HATE this. It's so annoying to have to squeeze the caulk out. A regular tube in a caulk gun is 10000000 times easier and I will never, ever buy this product again.
In short: this design is good for toothpaste. It is not good for caulk.
I will save the little cone tip, though, and try to use it on my next tube of regular caulk to keep it from drying out.
Chiquita is a very hairy cat
I brushed her for a minute or two last night, and this is how much hair came off.
I have this inexpensive cat brush, and I really like it. It's not as spiky as some I've tried before, and it obviously does a good job of removing her loose hair.
A cool shadow on my wall
Yesterday morning I was putting my shoes on and I noticed that the morning light was making an interesting shadow on my wall. It almost makes my little glass birds look like they are in a tree outside.
Look at these cute mushrooms
I found these on a New Year's Day hike that I went on.
It's crazy how teeny-tiny they are!
That's the end of my randomness for today. And now I want to know:
Do you love the feeling of taking down Christmas decorations? Or do you feel a little sad/wistful when they're gone for the year?
Also, did you take yours down yet?
My husband would leave Christmas up year round if I let him, he loves it so much, so our compromise is putting things away after my January birthday. They’ve been up two months by that point, which I feel is a fair shake! 😛
Re: caulk, I use a roofing nail (or just the largest nail on hand) to seal open tubes of caulk. The nail both seals the tube so it doesn’t dry out and keeps the nozzle clear of dried gook so you don’t have to recut and lose your tip. I was taught the nail trick in printmaking class back in the day; our inks came in the same style of tube and required caulk guns to dispense.
@N, that's just what I do. It works, except when the stupid caulk tube leaks out of the bottom and glues the whole shebang together.
@Central Calif. Artist Jana, Aww....mannnn. How annoying!
I am itching to take down Christmas decorations, hopefully tomorrow!
Ours will be coming down by the end of the week so my husband can continue spackling and painting our living room. We usually leave them up several weeks into January, and I'm always sorry to put them away. My mom loved Christmas and always made the holidays so very special for our family. Some of the decorations we use are hers, and I always feel a little closer to her at Christmas, even though she's been gone for twenty years. By the way, if you think Chiquita has a lot of loose hair, don't ever get an Alaskan Malamute!
I feel wistful at first—mostly thinking about how much more fun it is to put decorations up than it is to take them down. But I usually swap teams by the time it’s done and I’m really happy to have my regular living room back! It does look so much cleaner than normal (for the moment, anyway!). We usually de-decorate on New Year’s Eve.
Firmly in the "love" camp. Our living room is narrow, and the tree kind of sticks out into it. This is not great with all my children careening around, which they always are. Those same children never want me to take it down, but they know the official end of Christmas is Epiphany, and then the tree is coming down. Handy of the liturgical year to give me a hard and fast date like that. 🙂
@kristin @ going country, I'm all about the liturgical year, too. But we are wondering this year if my daughter's stuffiness is a little more than just getting over a cold. Is it an allergy to the tree? The tree might come down a little earlier this year, and I'm not sad about it. I'm ready for normalcy.
@Jody S., it may very well be the tree. I always had a real tree and thought I just got a cold every year near Christmas. Turns out it was an allergy. I really miss the scent of a real tree, but being able to breathe is so much better. Hope she feels better soon!
@Jody S., it turned out to be allergies to molds in the tree as well as the tree itself for my son. Took a trip to the ER to get to that. Fake trees from then on. That is like everything else and the memories and good feelies for the Christmas season that matter
Can the answer be..... both? I'm always a little sad, but also like the feeling of a fresh start.
Love the tiny mushrooms. God is the very best gardener.
I am not a big fan of taking down Christmas decorations though this year DH was not anxious for them to be put away like he is some years. I like the soft light the tree provides in the evening (all our lights are white).
It is on the to do list for this week.
Random is totally ok ☺️
While I love twinkle lights around-so soft and merry- I adore taking the decorations down. It feels so clean and fresh and uncluttered.
As my friend says, January 2 is her FAVORITE day of the year! Decorations and all the busy-ness is done. Normal life is pretty wonderful 😉
We did not put up decorations this year because I was out of town and a certain new kitty. I'm hoping by next year, he will be OK to put up decorations. We've only had him for a month and he's still learning the ways of the house. But after putting up decorations, I love the feeling of getting my house back in order.
I did a really in-depth cleaning of my living room on Monday as it so desperately needed it. This week I will do the rest of the house. It has been on my to-do list for a while.
And I had last week off and went back to work yesterday. And proceeded to go to bed at 7:30 PM last night because I could not warm up and I was exhausted. It was a great 11 hour sleep.
No tree this year, because we're in the midst of remodeling our new-to-us home, but normally I would take our tree down on the 26th, the literal day after Christmas. It feels festive to see it up during December, but as soon as Christmas comes and goes, it then feels like a chore waiting to be completed.
I enjoy putting the tree up right after Thanksgiving, but I enjoy taking it down the day after Christmas just as much. It feels like a fresh start to the upcoming New Year, and I love that.
@Tamara R, I am also a take down on the 26th! I love love love Christmas and put my tree up early. Once the day has come and gone I am ready to get my tiny leaving room back to normal.
Since I grew up not celebrating any holidays, I tend to decorate early and leave the decorations up for a while. My husband grew up leaving Christmas decorations up until after January 6th, so ours always stay up until at least then. This year, we're planning to leave them up through the end of January. It's my least favorite month; it just seems so cold, dark, and long. I like the idea of having the lights and sparkle of the Christmas tree to brighten up the worst month a little bit.
@Danielle L Zecher,
I, too keep mine up as long as I can as I enjoy them, plus I love the lights from the tree in the evening and early morning hours. I work full time, so I usually take my time taking them down and on the weekends mostly.
I plan to pack up the ornaments and take out the tree by the end of the week, and look forward to having that space back. I will leave up a strand of lights on our mantel and around the banister though, at least for another month, and my few decorations on the mantel will also stay for a while. They are wintery as much as they are Christmas -y.
I had taken most of the frankly Christmas things down but left the winter-y things up - stuff like pinecones and some pine greenery. We were enjoying the tree with just lights, but yesterday I finally took that down, too, and I did feel a little blue about it. But it was a very rainy day off, so the time was right. I love the feeling of clean and organized in January so taking the tree down meant much dusting and straightening and seeing my home in a fresh light.
I like putting them up but I like the cleanliness and order when they're down. Plus I find them depressing when they're left up too long. (A friend of mine once left his up till Mother's Day! I said to him, don't you find it depressing? No, he said, it reminds me of Christmas. Oookay.)
May I just reiterate how much I adore my organization person? She is so good and so motivational. Never in a million years would I have done the stuff she's doing and I am loving my house more.
I too have purchased the squeeze things of caulk and truly dislike them.
More randomness: I am meeting with my landscaper today to discuss ripping out my front hedge, which adds zero interest or attractiveness to the place, and replacing it with landscape roses.
The org person does keep decorating the kitchen with snail shells, though. I told her they're in the kitchen cabinet for eating with escargot. Not sure if she believes me.
@Rose, would love to hear more about what you're decluttering/organizing. Are you just emptying out a lifetime of stuff or decluttering collections?
@Anne, I'm not getting rid of my collections. I've barely built them back to what they were before they were decimated in the wake of my divorce. (Had to sell things to make ends meet, pay for lawyers etc. Yes, I sometimes wept as I did.)
It's mostly just owning too much junk and paring back. Clothes, books, stuff in the basement, rearranging things neatly, getting rid of old beach chairs that no longer work, papers I don't need, and detritus like the three washing machines in my daughter's closet. Too much artwork, craft projects, etc etc. My daughter's Pack n Play (to be fair, it's been used by visitors over the years), which my son is going to bring along to pen up the new pup on the drive back from picking her up (will involve a motel/hotel stay).
Some things, like my set of Hull clocks, I no longer have room for and don't want to deal with selling on eBay, and they're only worth about $50 each anyway so I'll donate to the local animal rescue thrift shop. Lots of clothing has been donated to the local women's DV shelter.
Some things I literally don't know what to do with, like BFF's Edward Gorey stuffies, but I can't donate or sell them because she left them to me.
@Anne, Also I'm lazy and tired all the time and I am not a person, unlike so many, who gets a thrill out of a nicely decluttered closet. Well, I do as long as I'm not the one doing the work. Sadly, I am a "if the closet door closes, we're good" person. Heh.
We would be a good match in this arena if we lived close by. I DO get a thrill out of decluttering!
@Rose, that is a lot going on at once. No wonder you're tired! It takes a lot of energy & time to do all that, luckily you have your helper. 😉
Good for you knowing you need to do this (for yourself) & getting it done over time.
@Regina, Oh, I've had chronic fatigue syndrome since 1990. Not a day has passed since that I've not been tired. Then I got even worse after being hospitalized for Covid in November 2020. And then even worse after a bacterial infection a year ago.
And once the place is finished, if anyone would like, I will take some pics and if Kristen agrees, we can post them.
Works for me!
@Rose,
I'm not good in the decorating department, but could a floating shelf or shelves be installed for the Edward Gorey stuffies to be displayed? Or do you not even want them displayed, because they'd have to be dusted, etc etc., and/or they'd be too out of place with your decor. Just throwing out an idea.
@Rose, I would love to see before and after pictures.
@Liz B., Well I do have a number of Gorey artworks and a place in my mind to display them, so who knows, maybe I'll put the stuffies there. I have to figure out what to do about the tags, too. I HATE tags on things, they really annoy and disturb me, but BFF left them on because things are worth more.....ah, the hell with it, the tags are going. Sorry, BFF!
@Rose, oh yay i would love to c photos. am so sorry for your health issues. i hope 2024 is a better year for you. could you post photos of gus and the new puppy?
We have taken our tree down. We had a new-to-us tree this year. We put it up at the end of October as a practical joke and its stayed up. We have slightly longer festive holidays here in Australia so I wanted physical and mental space to make some bigger changes in our house.
A great secondary brush for hairy cats is a Furminator. Most brushes only remove hair from the top coat. The Furminator gently removes loose hair from the undercoat. It makes a noticeable difference to reduce both shedding and hairballs.
@Michael, Is it good for longhaired cats? I've been using a regular wire brush and a silicone brush on our cat, but I wonder if a Furminator would be more efficient. He doesn't really like to be brushed a lot (I use treats to bribe him), so I try not to do a lot at once. He has a mid-length coat, not super long.
I am very lucky that Chiquita really enjoys being brushed. This is a new experience because Shelley barely tolerates it!
@Karen A., It's great for long haired cats or dogs. My sister uses one on her two excessively fluffy and huge Great Pyrenees.
which reminds me: for anyone who has a long haired dog or cat, or who has long and snarly hair like mine, a tube of gel called Cowboy Magic really is magic. I think it was originally for horse manes and tails but it's wonderful on any snarl, better than anything else I've used.
@Rose, agree about Cowboy Magic. I use it on my horse's very long tail which tangles easily. Cowboy Magic also carries shampoo and conditioner.
Both, I love my house streamlined and clean but I love the coziness of the Christmas lights at night.
I have a friend who has an elaborate Christmas village and train. Also grandchildren, they leave everything up including the fake tree in the living room. On July 1st they say they are ahead of the game in decorating.
@karen, I have my mom's Christmas village and train. Parts of it are from the 30s and 40s--the old cardboard putz houses and the old lead figures. I love putting the 30s bride and groom up right in front of the church, which is about the same size. So much vintage charm.
I’m ready to put away some of the Christmas extras, but hate the lights going away! I also hate how bare everything feels just as the gloom of winter is starting. The past couple years, I’ve kept a strand of white lights on my mantel that we refer to as my “happy lights”. They get put away when winter ends. I also keep a few non-Christmas specific winter themed items around, like snowflakes and non-decorated pine trees.
By the time January comes around, I am always happy to put my decorations away until next year. It does feel like a fresh start and is very welcome. I feel like the Christmas season has become a long marathon beginning in October and coming to an abrupt end on December 26th.
When I was growing up, our tree went up in mid-December, and we kept all Christmas decorations out through January 6th. We would have a little celebration at breakfast on Epiphany then all our decorations would come down. I continued this tradition with my own children.
Now that my children are grown, I start taking down my Christmas decorations after New Year’s Day as time permits. I leave my tabletop Nativity out until January 6th. Since my adult children no longer live under the same roof with me or even in the same state as I, we no longer have a celebratory breakfast marking the 12th day of Christmas.
I usually start taking down decorations on Jan 1, but leave our main tree up until Jan 6. I also like the clean feel of starting over.
I love the normalcy after all is put away, too! I'm officially called the Scrinch (Scrooge plus Grinch) at my house. We put our Christmas decorations up over Thanksgiving weekend and everything comes back down December 26! I think it is the teacher in me. I have a break over Thanksgiving so I have time to put them up. And then I have a break at Christmas so I want to get it down ASAP to enjoy the normalcy and get other stuff done before I go back to work.
Like more commenters I have taken out the Christmas decorations and left some winter ornaments (that is: pine cones and fairy lights). I am burning the fairy lights until the batteries are empty. Batteries typically always have some [looking for word] residual tension left when we call them "empty" and that makes them a fire hazard if stored incorrectly. I want them as empty as possible, both for the recycling station (non-rechargable ones) and for our own home (the rechargable ones).
Never store in a hot environment, near combustible material, near glass, mirrors, or polished metals in the sun. Or so I was told by a firefighter.
Usually, I can barely wait for Christmas to be over to clear the decor. I've been known to pack up Christmas decorations by 6 AM the next morning. However, this year, I did a it more decorating inside the house and liked it so much that it was the FIRST time ever I hesitated to take it down. However, we (my dauther and I) took everything down 12/27 and I love how clean and fresh it looks now.
One of the advantages of hardly decorating for Christmas at all is that there isn't much to do when the New Year rolls round. Yesterday, I put away my mother's needlepointed "Merry Christmas" and "Happy New Year" signs; took down the bough of curbpicked greens on the front of the house, put the greens on the vertical brush pile in my back 40 that I call the "organic fence," and stored away the bow for reuse; and tucked all the holiday cards into a big envelope for reference when I'm doing next year's cards. (I'll then reuse the fronts of as many cards as possible for gift tags.) And, poof, I'm done. Bring on a fresh start for 2024!
@A. Marie, your decorating and undecorating style sounds like exactly the right approach for me—simple, mostly natural, frugal, practical.
I am always eager to put the decorations up, but by December 26 I'm done and start taking them down. I like to start the year with a neater space.
I would like to have already had my decorations down and put away in the attic, but my daughter has had the flu since Friday afternoon and that has kept me busy. I can't get the bins down from the attic (or put them back) so doing it alone isn't going to work. Maybe Thursday or Friday when my husband will be able to help.
I have a love/hate relationship with Christmas decor. The thought of dragging it all out and decorating is almost enough to keep me from decorating - but of course my 14-year old daughter would never stand for that! Once it is all out (which is NOT much at all--our tree, and a few other things like a nativity set and wreath) I think it makes everything feel cozy. Then after Christmas I just want everything to put itself away and to have the house feel a little less cluttered.
I thought I was the only one that loved taking down decorations:) I had my two boys play a very active role in helping this year. They did a really good job and had lots of fun just hanging out with each other. So I count that as a win!
My randoms:
My three-legged dog has beagle-like fur - not long, not short, not thick, not thin - and he sheds it all over just like beagles can do. Maybe he's part beagle? I'm looking for a brush that will work better to get all the loose hair out when I brush him. I have to be careful with what I use on his hindquarters, though, since his leg was removed high at the hip, and he's still quite nervous about being brushed on that hip.
I am in the process of removing Christmas decorations, and it makes me sad to take them down, but I always feel very satisfied to have it all done. For me, too, it feels like a fresh start. This week is my week to thoroughly clean the porch and living room, which coincides well with the un-decorating of both places. I've made a good start. I have to finish up by this weekend for Epiphany. I have a large storage closet upstairs, so all that décor, except for the tree, has to be lugged upstairs, which is no fun. I put the tree in its box in my craft-room closet. It takes up some room in there, but it beats hauling the heavy tree parts up and downstairs at Christmas time.
The tiny mushrooms are so cute! I love tiny things.
A really random aside: I sewed pillowcases for my younger grandkids as part of their Christmas gifts, and they are thrilled with them. I never would have imagined that a pillowcase could be such a good gift.
@JD, my college-aged daughter still loves (& uses) a handmade pillowcase a relative made for her! I think it's sort of like a hug that's always available. It's great how much your grandkids love them!
I love Christmas decorations but always want them to put away before I go back to work on Jan 2nd. It does make a me a little sad when all the pretty lights are packed away. The mantle looks so odd without all the decorations, so I kept a few white and silver decorations and lights up for now. Everything else is pretty much back in the closet. The live Christmas tree on the deck is "untrimmed" but still needs to be taken for disposal.
@Beverly, Goats really love eating pine trees (& its safe). I always preferred to take to farm with goats instead of being chipped by city/county.
@Regina,
I didn't know goats would eat pine trees! A local state park near me is requesting folks drop off their "real" trees (all decor taken off) at the park, as they want to submerge them in the huge park lake to create a "fish habitat". How cool is that?
@Regina, my friends who used to keep llamas used to get a few leftover Xmas trees every year to give to the llamas. It's important to be sure that they've never been sprayed with any chemicals, though.
They sell little silicon tips to go on standard caulk tubes and they work great!!
I love when the tree goes up...kicks off the season. BUT I REALLY LOVE when the tree comes down, everything is put away, cleaned up and fresh. It's like the start of the new year and starting off right. I always want to leave it up through Epiphany, but that has only happened one time.
All my Christmas decorations are down and neatly stored because I didn't put any up this year. No fuss, no muss. This may turn into a New Year's Resolution...
Kristen, your eyes. Xx.
You mean one looks bigger than the other? That’s just the distortion of the phone camera selfie lens!
@Kristen, I totally think she meant it as a compliment... "beautiful eyes, xx!" 🙂
Ohhhh, lol, I was looking at the big X and the small x and thinking that meant something. Ha.
When I grew up in country where Santa Clause lives, the Christmas tree was not brought into the house until Christmas Eve to be the crown of Christmas, to be taken down after the Epiphany on January 6 or even January 13, 20 days after Christmas.
Christmas is celebrated for three days on Dec 24-26 (the last being the Boxing Day or St. Stephen's festival), and the preparations started gradually on the first advent when it was appropriate to take out the first decorations. January 6 is also a day off from work, and kids get off school until January 7.
It feels strange to start Christmas so early in the U.S., especially when it's still like fall outside, and to not settle into Christmas as a quiet, reflective time. Instead it's a full-on frenzy of shopping, a big unwrapping, and all done. I'm not religious, but it feels all wrong for the spirit of the darkest season of the year when we should stop for a moment and recharge for the new year.
I still wait until advent to start decorating to give some breathing room between Thanksgiving and Christmas, and bring in the tree a week later. If I wait too long, the trees are sold out. The tree stays until Epiphany or the weekend near it. I do start to declutter a bit to make it more gradual, but also keep my lit star in the window until closer to spring.
@Kristina M., your description of Christmas as a frenzy expresses my feelings. I like your approach to it as a quiet time of reflection. We do what we are able to block out the freneticism and noise and excess, and focus on what matters. Otherwise, I might lose what remains of my inner peace.
@Kristina M., it has become much more commercialized & frenzy. I was so surprised when you literally could not find tree by second week of December. And the what seems to be over pressured to buy bigger & more this year. I can't believe the discussions/posts of kids (adult & younger) that ask for so many exspensive things & from most everyone. (I have budget & limits) And the normalized trauma if don't get what asked for.
I don't like the rushed/pressure anymore of holidays. SO GLAD changed years ago (& upset some) to slow down.
@Kristina M., ❤️
@Kristina M., We try to keep to Advent as much as possible; it is an important time for us in the Church year. But the tree thing--! We would rather wait until the week before Christmas for the tree, but when we do, it is tough to find a tree at all.
@Regina, I think Covid changed the tree schedule for good, as people were stuck at home and wanted to bring in some Christmas cheer as early as possible. We used to buy the tree around mid-December, but definitely have had to adjust the schedule earlier!
I still buy presents and such, but really would like to do it more gradually and thoughtfully (doesn't help when my younger kids keep giving me Christmas wish lists until the day of!)
@Central Calif. Artist Jana, I'm with you! It's just hard when people around you are not doing the same, but we do what we can 🙂
I love the feeling of taking our decorations down. In fact, we travel for Christmas, and it would be my preference to take down our decorations before we leave, so we come home to a clean & tidy house. However, the rest of the family gives me a hard time about that. 😉
@Hawaii Planner, I totally relate to this. If we are traveling over Christmas I can skip right over the decorating as well. I'm successful at 'selling' my spouse on this about 50% of the time. LOL
If left up to the senior citizens in the house, we would no longer decorate because it's such a pain to put up and take down, but our mildly autistic adult son loves the tradition and we do it for him. Two weeks of keeping an eye on the tree to make sure rowdy cats and a new puppy were leaving it alone was enough this year: we undecorated on December 31.
I can see the spirit-lifting benefit of twinkle lights, though, and may go looking for some as a winter accessory in our rather dark living room.
These are my favorite kind of posts—thank you!
It's all I can do to not undo the decorations on December 26, but I force myself to wait until January 1. It is a relief to restore my home's decor to normal simplicity.
I also am not bothered by a Wednesday randomness post. 🙂
@Ruth T,
I love them! Thank you, Kristen. ☺
I guess I enjoy the calm feeling after putting the tree away. Right now I have two rocking chairs in my office (they were displaced by the tree and baby gear). We are leaving the Christmas decorations up until Epiphany. But I'm ready to put things away now.
I will be decluttering some ornaments I made over 15 years ago because I don't love them anymore.
I'm with you! I feel like my house takes a big deep breath when all that "stuff" is gone. I would take mine down late on 12/25 if I could, but we had a celebration on 12/26 this year so it had to wait until 12/27. I am loving all the clean and clear spaces in my house.
I took our mini Christmas trees with ornaments down New Years Eve??? I moved the light up snowmen to where trees were (on top of table) & just rearranged the few winter decorations on the tabletop. I bought a very small (maybe 4-5") light up ceramic tree after Christmas (only after holiday purchase) & it looks nice in winter decorations. That will stay up until Valentine's then get packed up also.
It's amazing what we find outside growing right now with the molder winter & lots of rain. I noticed that the raised potato bed (I forgot to dig up some potatoes) had multiples places of growth. I guess I should have thrown some grass seed out in places I need to fill in, it might have been perfect weather conditions & be done by spring.
I think that pets hair right now is trying to decide if winter or spring. Weather so up & down & animals fur/hair seems to be shedding a little more than normal. I'm not a cat person, though know some cat lovers, & don't think that's a lot unless you just did brushing day before.
Got to get back to work getting things ready for next week when normal routines resume.
Have great day everyone. 🙂
I love taking down the Christmas stuff too - getting the house back in order for the new year feels good. I don't love trying to figure out how it all fits in the bins and then in the garage cabinets, though. I love that my kids are old enough now to want to be involved in the decorating so taking it all down isn't too difficult for me to do.
I love the decorations going up and I also love them coming down!
I try to keep candles lit in the evenings for cheer and hygge.
Happy new year to everyone x
I'm more likely to be sad when the decorations go up (nostalgia and all). Several years ago, we gave away all of our ornaments and decor in a fit of minimalism. Then my sister gave me her few ornaments, stocking and candle from our childhood so that - along with several strings of clear tree lights from the thrift store - now constitute our decor. Simple, beautiful, frugal and meaningful. My husband is a Christmas tree farmer, and we put up a real tree about a week or so before Christmas. Then we put away everything (such as it is) on January 1. I just remembered that we have a couple outdoor pots that have some Christmas-y things in them so I'll be plucking those out sometime today. Also, I stick hard to my December 1st thru 25th Christmas music rule. For us, holidays are more special when they aren't drawn out, although I do like other people's ideas of leaving lights on the mantel to enjoy all winter. Happy New Year everyone!
Yes my tree is down. We weren’t home for Christmas so enjoyed up till 21st and it came down on the 30th. I too feel better getting the extra clutter out
I enjoy putting them up and I enjoy taking them down! We have little white fairy lights that we put up when we set the clocks back in the fall, and we take them down when it starts staying light pretty late in the spring. In fact, we learned about these particular fairy lights from you; one of your girls has them and you had recommended them!
I LOVE Christmas decor but for me I love the clean slate feeling that I get after taking it down. I am behind this year and the clutter of decor is starting to irritate me. I know lots of folks who advocate to leave their tree up all year long but I am the opposite. To me if we looked at it every day it would not be as special.
I will definitely finish removing all decor this coming weekend and I cannot wait. The house will also get a deep clean and then I can start the year with a lovely, truly clean slate 🙂
I don't like the process of putting things away (Christmas decorations...laundry...dishes!) But I LOVE the feeling that comes when it's done! It's been a week...house full of family...sickness...dreary weather...but today the sun is shining brightly and it's wonderful!
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Love to put the holiday decor up…and then i love to take it down! Never before New Year’s but any time now. We live very far north so we do leave outside lights on the path and shed and lit paper stars hanging in the windows until sometime in February. It’s nice to come home in the evening and see them glowing instead of just dark!
I feel both - first a little wistful, then later that awesome clean and back-to-normal feeling. I imagine that this going through of the the taking-down ritual allows Christmas to come to a close inside of me. I would guess that if I came home and it was all done by someone else, it might feel less rewarding or complete, somehow.
That reminds me, I also want to take some notes on my list app of things that did and didn’t work this year, and any ideas I may have right now about next year. That’s one of the things I’ve started doing since my adhd diagnosis, and it’s incredibly, unbelievably helpful to me. And it also feels like part of that closing-down Christmas process.
My in-laws left the morning of the 1st and we started taking them down almost immediately! I don't know that I've felt this way every year, but this year it felt so good to get them down and put them away. I miss the light from the tree in the early morning (we had ours set on a timer to come on every morning at 5am) and my living room seems dark in the mornings now, but it also seems so much bigger! In my current stage of life, I need clean and space and putting away the decorations gave me that and it feels great.
And your blanket on the sofa looks like an owl!!!! 🙂
Kristen, I love Chiquita looking up at you adoringly in that first photo.
Our Christmas tree and decor are still up, and will be put away, umm, whenever we feel like it.:-)
We tend to put it all out fairly late in December, and none of us is in any hurry to put it away, either. My hubby and son pit up a lot of holiday inflatables in our front yard every year - it's their special tradition - so I'm guessing those will be taken down this weekend.
We used to delay putting our tree up until about a week or so before Christmas (December is my very busiest season) and then leave it up well into January. But now that the kids are all grown and gone, we put it up the day after Thanksgiving while they are here to help decorate. And I will take everything down as soon as my husband can get the boxes back out of the attic over the garage - I don’t do heights and I don’t do ladders.
I’m another one allergic to the real trees. For me the first symptom wasn’t respiratory, it was that my hands and arms got terribly red and unbearably itchy the last few times I helped decorate a real tree - doing any kind of yardwork has the same effect on me if I don’t wear gloves. We love our 7 foot prelit Costco tree.
I love to see the decorations go up, and I love the clean feeling once everything has been put away.
I feel both emotions - a little sad when I start removing the decorations from the tree but totally happy putting furniture back where it normally belongs. I am leaving the non-tree decorations up for another couple of weeks.
My decorations are still up. I will take them down on Jan 7/Sunday.
I have mixed feelings about taking them down. I feel happy to be tidying up but then taking them down also means that it is January. Not my favourite month.
However, the last 2 years I have been fine with January. These days I pay attention to the plant life I see on my walks. Notice the evergreens, cedars and fir trees and the resting plants waiting for their growing season.
I took mine down this morning. It took a lot less time than putting everything up.
I’m not religious at all but the decorations have to be down by ephiphany, tradition over religiosity I guess.
I have dust allergies and I’m itching like crazy as it’s impossible to dust with all the decorations still up so we are taking them down in the morning.
I always feel sad when they come down but it is so nice to have a clean space again. I’m going to keep 2 sets of white lights out though for my two fireplaces. This is our first winter in this house and it’s a really dark lounge and dining room. It’s light and airy in the summer so it’s been quite a change! More lamps needed I think.
I both love it and feel wistful. We start in December and don't put up a tree till close to Christmas (Friday this year) and it stays up till Epiphany on the 6th.
Tree with just lights (we are trying out a reusable) and garlands may stay up through winter for their cheering effect.
I have a firm policy that anyone that takes down Christmas decor the day after may have psychopathic tendencies (this includes my mother) but I am equally looking forward to and dreading taking down my tree this weekend. Mostly bc I have a ten foot tree. But I do really want my house back to normal. I want to give it a deep clean and get all my regular knick knacks etc back so that I can have the space.
Chiquita, I love your glorious mane!
She is delightfully fuzzy for sure!
Caulk - Can you cut open tube and put in a sealed container to then scrape it on. Slightly easizer?
I could but I'd need a big project to work on because once I cut the tube I really won't be able save any leftover caulk!
I win! We took down our live 2022 tree on this Christmas Eve and then put up our live 2023 tree. Last year’s tree was tall, slim and elegant … and $80 at Lowe’s. It always looked so good that in June or July, I took a couple of needles and broke them to see if it was real. By Thanksgiving it was beginning to show some aging at the top but it was remarkable. Maybe it had been sprayed with something. Time and circumstances pass quickly some years. But it does seem wrong somehow to kill a live tree for just a short period of joy. We always have put up our tree on Christmas Eve.
I genuinely and enthusiastically extend the decorating season before and after Christmas. Much of what I display can be altered to simply celebrate winter. A lighted artificial birch tree has snowflakes and winter bird decor. A metal sleigh has Winnie the Pooh characters in toques and scarves. Pine cone LED garland adorn the piano top. The living Christmas centrepiece is kept watered with the seasonal parts removed. Blue hue LED lights replace the multicoloured lights of December. Since winter is a challenging season north of the 49th I choose to embrace its inner beauty. Best parts are the majority of my decorations are thrift purchases from second hand sources.
Not down yet. We usually wait for Epiphany. I used to feel wistful, but not any longer.
I took my Christmas tree and decorations down new years day. There’s something soothing about wrapping up the porcelain ornaments and putting away the wall hangings my gran lovingly made. Though once they’re away the living room looks very bare.
So, um...my tree stayed up all year last year...mostly due to laziness, but maybe some residual trauma processing too. It's a fake tree and not really in the way because it's in an upstairs hallway so it was easier to just leave it there. I did unplug it after about January, and then in December, all I had to do to decorate was plug it back in. Maybe I'll take it down this year. More trauma has happened though, so I dunno...I guess we'll see.
Aww, Becca. I'm so sorry that traumatic things have been happening to you. Sending love.
@Becca, I'm sorry. Love from Long Island.
@Rose, @Kristen,
Thanks for the love. I'm hoping 2024 will bring some much needed healing.
I LOVE Christmas. Absolutely love it. AND I love Christmas being over! I do a lot of decorating. Takes me days. Taking it down doesn’t take quite so long, just packing into bins is quicker than arranging things. I’m almost back to normal, all I need do is enlist hubby’s help to get 13 bins back into the storage closet under the stairs. It’s a Tetris-type operation. They only all fit nicely one way, and one way only. I leave one partially empty bin in the front for the inevitable stuff I missed, and anything I happen to buy at an after-Christmas sale. Just toss it in.
I feel sad when I take down the Christmas decorations and notice my neighbors have done it too. It looks so cheerful when they are around and we have to wait 11 months to do it again. Once spring is here, all will be well again!
It was a random day for me, too. In some ways I'm back in the saddle after the summer, fall, and holidays. In others, I'm very much not. It's hard to get motivated sometimes, even to take the dog for a walk (I have a good sized back yard).
Will be taking down the tree on Saturday evening. We kept it in the formal living room behind french doors so that raucous pup didn't destroy the very old blown glass ornaments. My Gram used to set her tree up with popcorn garland, cranberries and half oranges. She later added peanut butter smeared pine cones rolled in bird seed. That stayed up for another month. She also left her back door wreath up and decorated it with red hearts and pink ribbons for Valentines Day if it still looked good. She was such a joyful soul, miss her. As the babies are born (her Great, greats) I have been giving them thick flannel receiving blankets with her crocheted lace trims. I like each baby to have a bit of her love. I asked her to make them for a church project, but I secreted away a few dozen for the future.
It is gray in Michigan so I keep the battery candles and electric candles out with some snowman things on a shelf. In late January I get out Valentine things and the candles still add much needed light. But I am ready to put away the tree and Christmas things today.
My decorations came down the 31st. Usually it is on the 1st but this it was just time. And it felt good to have it done.
I went on a cold walk yesterday and was struck by the beauty of winter. No snow here yet this season, which is wild, but the older I get, the harder it is to walk in ice and snow so I'm not sad about that.
I used to always take my tree down a few days after Christmas because I liked a fresh, clean start to the new year. But ever since the lockdowns, I have counted on the lights to cheerfully usher in the new year. Mine will stay up until this weekend.
I definitely have a love/hate relationship with removing all the Christmas decorations. I love all the lights and color but also like the clean result of putting it all away.
This year I will be having surgery next Monday and have pretty much decided to leave my tree up (minus all the ornaments except for the little silver stars) for weeks since my recovery will be slow. The lights will make the weeks of staying home very comforting!
All the other Christmas stuff is down and getting put away today. And I am setting up lots of battery candles for more candlelight!
Bring on winter!
I am always ready for the Christmas decor to go down, but a little sad too. I put out some snowmen and winter decor until about March 1st which helps.
For me, when it’s over it’s over! I have a daughter whose birthday is early in January. When she was little it was always a rush to switch the house from holiday to birthday decor. Especially if she had a birthday party. Maybe that’s when I started to enjoy the tidy look of things after the holidays.
i just love your blog. whatever you write i read. am so glad that you still have time for your blog. i celebrate chanukah and it is always a bit sad to put away the menorah and stop playing dreidel with my kids and chocolate.