Christmas Decorating Tips

Don’t forget the glass ball ornaments!

Don’t forget the glass ball ornaments!

The other night, January 7, 2013 I was watching a Christmas movie. Yes, I’m still watching Christmas movies and I still have the tree and other decorations lit up! Back to the point…I was watching a Christmas movie when I glanced over at the Christmas tree. I was trying to figure out what makes a Christmas tree so calmingly beautiful. Is it the ornaments? Is it the lights? Is it the shape of the tree? Is it the little village under the tree? It can’t be the presents because all of the presents are long gone. What I came up with is, maybe it is all of it!

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Because I was looking so intently at the tree I noticed that each of the glass ball ornaments had many flecks of sparkle on them from reflecting the lights. On one ornament alone I counted 21 little flecks. 21 times the 24 glass ball ornaments I have on the tree equals 504 flecks of sparkle. I thought, “Boy, that’s a lot of added tree sparkle just by making sure your tree decorations include glass ball ornaments (not ones with the matte finish).”

When I decorated Santa’s and my first Christmas tree (1974) I bought a few boxes of glass ball ornaments put them on the tree along with some lights and voilà my tree was decorated! I started collecting more unique ornaments but for years the mainstay was the glass ball ornaments.

tree-glass-ball-ornaments-2-72Now after almost 40 years my tree decorations mainly consist of ornaments collected throughout the years. Quite a few of them are Hallmark or other non-shiny ornaments. I’ve always included glass ball ornaments to accentuate a particular color theme for my tree. For many years a used pink glass ball ornaments on the tree and now for the last 15 years I have used red. Like I said this was just to accentuate a color theme. It was only this year that I discovered the sparkle that they add to a tree. So, even if you decorate your tree with unique ornaments or if you decorate your tree with a country look….Don’t forget the glass ball ornaments! They add sparkle and sparkle is magical!

When does Mrs. Claus take down her Christmas Decorations?

When does Mrs. Claus take down her Christmas Decorations?

I get asked this question a lot! Santa and I are busy with out of town appearances starting before Thanksgiving up to Christmas Day. We have even been gone for 6 weeks straight! So, the day after Christmas is when we really get to relax and start to enjoy all of our holiday decorations. If it were up to Santa we would leave them up all year. I just can’t bring myself to have Christmas Decorations up all year round (plus I really enjoy decorating for other holidays).

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I know a lot of people take down their decorations the day after Christmas…that’s not what we do! I understand that sometimes a dried up Christmas Tree dictates the take down schedule and that cannot be helped. Once you take down the tree you might as well take down everything else, too.

Two years ago we went to a faux tree (OK, FAKE!) We really did not want to stop getting a real tree but because of being out of town so much and having to put up our decorations so early it became a necessity. A real tree just doesn’t work for us anymore.

Now, back to the original question… I don’t even think about taking down the Christmas Decorations until the Epiphany (January 6th.) After that day I start to think that maybe it’s time to take them down. It usually takes 7-10 days to take everything down mainly because I don’t work on it every minute of the day. I figure if I get them down in time for Valentine’s Day decorations to go up I’m doing fine!!!