Rushing the holiday season

 Not too long ago I was in the camp of people that would never decorate

before Thanksgiving.  But then I opened a little store selling home decor

items including Christmas.  But I held fast to my rule of "not before Thanksgiving".

Major boo-boo in the world of retail, and I found out the hard way.

I waited too long and got stuck with a lot of inventory.  It seems

shoppers may wait to decorate, but they start buying early to get the best

stuff.  So the next year I put it out early, and my sales were great.

 That softened up my hardened stance...and it went hand in hand with being

a blogger.  People are looking for inspiration for how they want to decorate 

for the holidays.  Back in the good ol days it was more a matter of take out

the Christmas boxes from the attic and put up what you had in your stash of

years of collecting and passed down treasures.  Now its a designer world

in Christmas land.  And trees are done in themes, not family heirloom style.

My idea is that the tree is going to stay naked.

For a few weeks, until Thanksgiving.  

And that way its more of a wintery woodland type of decoration. 

 Hahha. Okay, well I can call it that, right?

I have to say I love seeing a twinkling tree in my living room!

So much so, that this year I decided to put it in a better spot, and that meant

rearranging the furniture and shoving the baby grand across the room.

Thankfully it rolls pretty easily on its castors, and my son helped me for

the better part of the day.  

 Colby was put in his kennel while the furniture moved and tree went up,

and when he emerged, he was as good as he was last year about ignoring the tree.

A few blue glass balls are spread across the leaf garland...

And a large silver tray holds pumpkins and blue glass ornaments

on the top of the white piano.

 Its been kind of a surprise how much I am enjoying the mixing 

of decorative elements of the two holidays.

So thats how its unfolding over here...and one more plus is that having

our tree set up, albeit naked, its going to be a great backdrop for our

family Christmas card this year!

 However I completely get it if you are in Thanksgiving mode and

that is the only thing on your radar.  I used to be just like that myself.

 This year I am hosting dinner, and I just hope everyone enjoys the twinkle

of the tree in the other room....