Rose is Rose by Don Wimmer and Pat Brady for December 27, 2013

I don’t even decorate anymore. Too old to tired.

Take them down on Twelfth Night (Jan 6th).

If you follow old traditions and only put up the tree & decorations on Christmas Eve then they are only up for less than a fortnight and don’t have time to get tired. The trouble with putting up decorations in November is that you are tired of them well before Christmas itself.

They can stay up all year. Just like my outside Christmas lights do.

It isn’t worth going to all that work to have it up for 15 days (December 24 to January 8). I usually put my decorations up the day after Thanksgiving and take them down a day or two after New Year. This year I didn’t get around to doing that and just put up a table top tree. It didn’t make any difference to anyone. I decorate for myself, not others.

When you have a cat like Peekaboo, all your decorating has to be on the ceiling, like at Rose’s.

Trees and ornaments are just seasonal playthings. Keeping all the decorations packed away because ot the cat’s destructive nature sure does dampen the Christmas spirit, though. Too bad Siamese cats live so long… I really do miss my Christmas tree, lights and collectable decorations.

I decorate the day after Thanksgiving, and take it all down New Year’s Eve to start the year fresh and clean. Long enough to enjoy, short enough to not be sick of it. Also, now that my daughters are a little older, less effort for me! My husband works 3rd shift, so on New Year’s Eve the girls and I have a “pajama party” and incorporate the undecorating as part of the festivities.

When we decorated they went up a week or ten days prior to Christmas and came down January 2nd. Don’t even bother with a tree anymore.

It is officially over.

I was told if you leave tree up after New Years Day you’ll have bad luck all year.

I put the tree up the weekend of Thanksgiving and take it down usually on New Years Day. I have cats and still do a lot of decorating. I never heard of that superstition animemom. I never take my tree down before New Years and so far, haven’t had bad luck all year in any year.

TRADITIONALLY (Christian Tradition) says that Christmas starts Dec. 25, and lasts 12 days, until Epiphany on January 6th.I take my decorations the week after January 6th.

Up here in Wisconsin they often leave the outside decorations up till May, when the weather finally gets a little decent . . .

I was sorry to miss the Meeting of the Sweaters that I anticipated from yesterday’s comic…

Maybe, maybe not.

I suggest that the official time to get the Xmas decorations down (if not sooner) should be the weekend of Martin Luther King Day (3rd Monday in January).

When I was working, I always took mine down outside the first weekend after New Years. This year, with all the fun I’m having away from home (and nobody here) I only took out 3 fiber-optics (a tree, a gingerbread house and tree, and an angel). I’ll pack them away in about a week. My neighbors are probably thinking “that poor old granny doesn’t have energy to put up decorations” (I prefer that to the truth ;-D).

The 12 days of Christmas (despite the store sale ads) is from the 25th of December to the 5th of Januray. And believe it or not, it’s a religious holiday – so why would you stip celebrateing in the middle of it? IN fact, before it became so much a commercial event, it was a minor holiday and gifts traditionally given on the same day the magi presented gifts to The Christ . . 5 January.

We decorate to bring joyous sharing and our version of the season. We all know it’s about a baby born 2000 years ago. The trappings add to the joy for some, work for others but to each his own.

In some Spanish speaking countries, gifts are exchanged on “Three Kings Day”!

I’m surprised that the Filipinos don’t decorate that much. Most of them are Catholic; but perhaps it isn’t part of their culture. I’m not up on that. I just took part in my first posada this Advent.

Assulted by garland

It is so sad when decorations come down while it is still Xmas and it is still Xmas through January 6. How can it be bad luck to leave the decorations up for the entire holiday?

We put the tree up late as we travel in early part of Dec, so we actually leave everything up until mid January (3 trees, etc.) and shut off the outside lights when we are the last one left.

Swedish christmas tradition: Put the decorartions up 4 Sundays before Christmas (“1 advent”), then take them down 20 days after Christmas.AND we are doing all the celebrations on Christmas Eve (the 24:th), not the Christmas day!