Deck the Halls

While most people are digesting their Thanksgiving meal (sleeping off the tryptophan), I am all abuzz decorating my mom's house for Christmas. I put up the tree (artificial due to my pine and mold allergy), force my sleepy dad to string the lights and then put up all of the other holiday decorations. Once my mother's house is done, it is on to my own. The Friday after Thanksgiving, I am busy once again, decking my own halls. After I finish at my house, I move onto my Noni's (this year I will be decorating her nursing home room) and then on to help my Mother In-law. It is a busy weekend and I am known in my family as the "Christmas Elf". I love to spread Christmas cheer.

This year, I decided to start a little early. My sister and I took Z and G to see Santa the Tuesday before Thanksgiving. We did this last year and it worked out great. There are no lines, Santa and his staff are in a good mood and then we can pass the pictures around at Thanksgiving. Last year we got a great shot, this year....well let's just say that my sister and I are in it :)

After our visit to Santa, I was in the Christmas Spirit. Z and I listened to the Chipmunks sing "Jingle Bells" the whole ride home and I knew what was going to happen that afternoon :) Z looked at me oddly as I started rearranging furniture and vacuuming up a storm. Once he went down for a nap, I put on the Christmas music, poured a small cup of light eggnog and began hauling boxes up from the basement. In the three hours that he was asleep (thanks Z for the long nap), I had the entire house decorated. When Z came downstairs, he was shocked to find his house "Christmafied". He spent the entire night running from room to room shouting "Christmas tree", "baby jesus", "santa" and it went on and on.

When S got home after his guys night out...he couldn't believe that I had the entire house decorated already. I smiled and told him that I wanted to have our house decorated before I went and spread my Christmas cheer to the rest of the family.

I always enjoy pulling out the boxes of decorations and reminiscing about all of the past Christmases. I have some of Noni's decorations, my mothers and have collected quite a few of my own over the years. There are still a few boxes downstairs and we will pull them out when we decorate our tree on Friday with Z. It will be fun chatting with S about where we got the different ornaments and I know Z will be very into decorating the tree this year.

As you can see, he also has his own tree. This is a 3 ft tree that I picked up at Walmart for my classroom. We gave him this tree last year and he decorates it with plastic balls and unbreakable ornaments. He knows that it is the only tree that he is allowed to touch and truly treasures it.

So now I have decorated two homes and I have two more to do. I so enjoy being the Christmas Elf! So if any of you out there want some assistance, let me know! I would be happy to help you deck your halls this season!