Christmas Memories: Decorations
This weekend I hauled a fake tree and two plastic boxes home from my parents house so that my husband could do the heavy lifting and bring the tree inside. We are officially ready to start decorating for Christmas! I’m learning about decorating now that we have our own place. Of course I’ll be decorating a completely different place next year, but as a concept, I am forming my own decorating style. It’s very minimal right now, probably because we don’t have a whole lot of things to decorate with, or places to put things, for that matter. But we’re working on it.
We were never one of those families that completely transformed the whole house for Christmas. We always had a tree, of course, and the penguins my mom loves so much came out in full force along with the snow babies that we got every year. We’d bring out the lights and the holiday glassware and the winter themed pillows, but we never went as crazy as some people manage.
And yet, somehow our house always felt festive. My mom would transform the top of the entertainment center into a tiny winter wonderland. Some white material of some kind acts as a blanket of snow for the snow babies to play in. Every year she gets a new snow baby to add to the collection. The top of the hutch is home to all the penguins it can possibly fit, most decked out in holiday scarves or hats. Tea lights have been added to the living room to add to the holiday glow from the Christmas tree. They’re just little things, but they some how manage to set the whole tone for Christmas.
And, of course, growing up there was always mistletoe. Fake mistletoe, not like a fresh sprig or anything, but that plastic plant provided much entertainment for three children determined not to get caught under it. It always hung in the archway between the kitchen and the living room at the old house, and then in the doorway between the kitchen and the hall in the new house, I believe. I’m not sure if my family even pulls it out anymore. Sometimes I think I should look into getting some of our own, if only for the fun of it. I’m not sure anyone actually adheres to the tradition of kissing whomever you get caught under it with, but I feel like it’s a nice excuse to kiss your sweetheart, when you get the chance.
Perhaps when I actually have a house of my own I’ll look into doing more decoration-y things. My main form of decoration here is a wooden salad bowl filled with tinsel and plastic silver ornaments as a center piece to my coffee table. And the tree, of course. When we were little we would sometimes do a paper chain, which was always fun. I have so much construction paper, I might find myself making one this year for my own amusement. How ever you choose to decorate, I hope you are having much holiday fun, dear friends.
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