The anticipation I feelin the fall for the upcoming holidays is exceeded only by the dread this time of year. The house looks so forlorn when we finally get around to taking down all the trees and baubles, knickknacks and gewgaws we've accumulated over the last 50 Christmases. David refuses to hoist the tree into the attic anymore so this year he built a shelf in his garden shed just for storing the tree. It's not big enough for the two dozen or so other containers so they go in the attic again.
He took the tree down a week ago, early for us. Last year I didn't want to let go of the holiday feeling, so I did some research and little did I know that I am not the only one who keeps their decorations up until the very last minute. I think the grandkids enjoy seeing them up at our house longer since their folks fly through their houses like a pox will be upon them if decorations are not taken down on Dec. 26. Our children were definitely not raised that way. It takes a lot of work to get the house looking this festive, so what if we have our house decorated three months of the year? We're old, slow and tired so give us a break.
There are several good reasons not to take everything down until February 2. English Heritage* encourages us to leave the tree up until Candlemas (40 days after Christmas) which falls on February 2. This opposes the idea that leaving them up beyond Twelfth Night is bad luck, which is a fairly modern tradition. I'll ignore the fact that most of those people didn't decorate until Christmas Eve.
After David’s back and knees recovered somewhat he finally tackled bringing down the boxes. He stacked them in our hallway so there's barely room to get to the bathroom and our granddaughter's bedroom. Some of them have to stay in the garage for a bit.
Why is it that every time we un-decorate I manage to leave something out? Every stinking time. David hates going back up to the attic so we put them in a room and promptly forget about them. I have an Easter plaque in the garage. David refused to dig for the right container. We have a 'Happy Fall, Y'all' sign hanging behind the front door. We just decorated around it.
After finally getting everything boxed and cleared away our granddaughter noticed that we'd left our singing Santa hat out.
We were at our daughter's house recently and I found myself marveling while looking around her living room. Everything was stowed away, and it looked clean and crisp. She did not inherit my need to fill up all the spaces on the walls and shelves. How in the world can we be so opposite? She and her husband do have the same propensity as I for stuffing things in little used rooms and the garage. Out of sight, out of mind is my motto.
It's been a few days now since I got all our decorations boxed up and I still haven't been able to put my treasures back in their rightful places. I shoved them onto the glass shelves around the television until I could deal with them and wouldn't you know the boys came to spend several nights. I can't work while they're here, now can I? My job is to play games with them. Housework can always wait. Where is Marie Kondo when I need her?
*English Heritage is an organization in England that promotes history various ways including hands-on experiences. I like their way of thinking.