Beautiful, eld!

Any live Christmas decor I get, I will salvage bits and bobs from it and make something for the road post to my house for the following year.

This is from last year.

eld...That's a beautiful wreath. I have one that's NOT real greenery. I reuse it every year. I have a storm door, so it's not easily seen.

Dh and I were very surprised to find such a lush wreath for this price.

I'm Jewish and don't have wreaths. But, I love that my down the hall neighbor comes back from Maine every year with a wreath that she decorates and places on her apartment door. It is beautiful. She uses little stuffed Beatrix Potter animals. I find familiarity and comfort in her ritual.

good job, eld. That is lovely.

Kendrah, I’m Jewish but married to a Catholic. He appreciates that I do these things for him.😊

I was so surprised that the wreath prices were so expensive, so I bought three at Traders for $12.99, and they are nice for the price with pine cones. I added winterberries and some realistic little grapes and apples, and they're pretty. Yours is lovely.

I buy a live wreath from Costco every year. I remove the red berries and add my own sparkly leaves and artificial fruit. I weave a wide red ribbon with gold border in and out around the wreath. Almost done...now to attach a picture wire hanger and...oops, I'll have to wait for DS to come and loop the wire over the nail in the top of the front door.

This is the first year I'm too short to reach the top of the door, standing on the step stool. Like the witch from OZ, "I'm shrinking! I'm shrinking!"

It nust be twenty years since I bought the original artificial wreath with the decorations.

When I was a child our neighbor hung three foot long red and white foam candy cane on her entry door, beneath a glass storm door. One morning she heard someone struggling with the storm door. She and could see the top of the door through a half circle window high in the entry door, but didn't see a person. She pulled the door open, startling a neighbor's little boy. He was standing on tip toes with his tongue out, trying to lick the candy cane.

Does every neighborhood have a 'roaming child'? This boy was ours. He was an escape artist who needed to explore the world. I should look him up.

So pretty, eld! You could also weave in some b-powered fairy lights.

rox, love the post decor! Even prettier with the snow!

I’ve often brought home tons of (free) cuttings from Home Depot or Lowe’s tree lots. They’re happy to have you take them. I make these simple swags for our lamp post and mailbox.

I'm also the person who rummages in HDs and Lowe's trimmings can that they cut from Xmas trees. I also picked up a lot of pine branches recently blown off a grove of trees nearby.

I wish I could tolerate evergreens in the house. All of your decor is so attractive and creative. I bought new garland and tartan ribbon this year, but ended up not using it. My decor is very quiet and simple this year.

Fun, there’s nothing wrong with quiet and simple. I prefer it over so much stuff you can’t focus on anything.😵‍💫 Also, you have to wonder where some people store all that stuff.

Kendrah, I’m Jewish but married to a Catholic. He appreciates that I do these things for him.😊

I'm so glad that he appreciates what you do. Was it strange for you when you first had Christmas decor in your home?

My husband was raised no-name new age Christian and doesn't care at all for Christmas. If he did, I would decorate. Hopefully over the years I would come to like it.

We once had a homeless older teenager live with us who really wanted a Christmas tree. I was excited to get one to make him feel at home. When it was up, I discovered that I didn't feel at home at all in my own house. It felt horrible to me and I absolutely couldn't wait to take it down. I wanted to be so open minded. I don't care about religion. I'm not even a very practicing Jew, but Christmas decor in my home felt truly awful and I couldn't will those feelings away even though I tried to.

Having the young man's friends over for a Christmas meal was wonderful, I was totally into making a ham, and we put on Motown Christmas music. I loved that part of the holiday.

I like seeing holiday decor at other people's homes. I was jealous of it when I was a kid. I was so surprised that I had such a strong reaction to it in my own home.

I grew up around a lot of Catholics. And something about all of the ritual and Latin masses feels more like Judaism to me than any other kind of Christianity. It is wonderful that you do the holiday for your husband.

@chloebud, I do have limited storage and I wonder sometimes why I have a disproportionate amount of decor that only gets used for one month out of twelve. That's another reason why I would love to be able to use fresh evergreen material...no storage needed.

Interesting message, Kendrah.

Kendrah, I totally get it. I'm Jewish and my husband is half Jewish, half Christian. He grew up with all of the decor, including a big Xmas tree. The first year we were in our apartment, I suggested getting one. Uggghh! It took up so much room, was messy and we had to watch out for the cat. Ordinarily I enjoy the smell of pine. But since trees here are sold on city sidewalks, I kept thinking maybe I also smelled dog pee. And although I have no problem with cut flowers, I found it really bothered me afterward that a whole tree had been cut down, only for us to end up throwing it in the trash. The next year my husband said he didn't want a tree, that he had only gone along with it because he thought I wanted it. That made me love him even more!

Never did a wreath, but last year I bought an herb wreath at the farmer's market to give as a hostess gift. It was really nice (and smelled way better than the tree.)

What a beautiful wreath Eld! We aren't decorating again this year. I've been down with norovirus for 4 days straight and just can't gather the energy.

So sorry KPonder. Speedy recovery.

We have pared down since both my daughters live out of the country.

I do a light up artificial garland over my fireplace and a few Christmas decor pieces inside.

Judipup, when we did our first tree we shopped at Fortunoff’s for decorations. I thought if I’m going to do this it shoukd be done right. Very expensive pieces. I still have quite a few, but as delicate as they are I did lose a few over the years.

Because DH is non practicing, decor for him is about tradition and being festive.

Kendrah, my BIL feels the same way as you do.

@eld6161, your wreath is beautiful. I love the ribbon especially, and what a great deal at $25.

I find our decorations get more and more simple. I donated quite a bit this year and could probably have done more if I had the time to go through it all. I did buy a new mailbox wreath because our old one was looking a bit tired, and woudn’t you know, all the decent ones I could find were lighted! We’ll see how it fares but I won’t be replacing batteries every week if they go. Yesterday I cut magnolia and Cedar branches for my 2 front pots. I arrange those plus some faux Christmas sprigs and call it done.

DH put the tree up yesterday but it is not decorated yet. I texted 2 of my neighbors to tell them they could come cut magnolia branches if they would like. They both said the same thing…tree up, not decorated, lol! We all got a good laugh over that.

Someone said this about lighted wreaths…‘(they)….don't last very long before the lights quit working.’ I ordered a new lighted wreath for the front door 3-4 years ago and this year half of the lights didn’t work. DH tried to fix it, gave up when he couldn’t remove the bulbs. I happened to be in town so bought a 50-light string with a battery pack at Home Depot and we replaced them.

Where do we store stuff? We have walk-in closets in our spare bedrooms. They aren’t huge, but I can put command hooks or nails kinda high on the wall and hang wreaths there without them being in the way. And they don’t get smushed by trying to store them elsewhere. We also have a large walk-up attic. Anything large and not damaged by extreme hot/cold temps can go up there. I keep a box of other more fragile items in that closet.

I have a beautiful wreath, hanging in the garage, under a sheet. It was an extra large one for over the fireplace in the 1 1/2 story living room. I don't have anyone to hang it for me anymore, and it's too scary for me to drag an extension ladder in to hang it. Hard to wrangle SIL over to hang for me. They are so busy with my grands, as it should be. So instead I put up a big artificial green roping and center a Nativity in it. But I put up wreaths in front of big mirror in living room, and a couple of wreaths in windows.

Ex husband told me squirrels chewed his outdoor lights on his door wreath. Not surprising, squirrels will follow the nuts.

I don't decorate. Never have in all my years of being homeowner. I wouldn't mind so much the process of putting it all up and enjoying it for a few weeks, but it's too much work to take it all down and store, so it's just not worth the hassle for me. I do at least put out a Christmas-themed tablecloth for meals, though :0)

Kendrah - Your comment made me think about my own relationship with Christmas. I grew up in a very odd neighborhood. In the middle of Pennsylvania Dutch country, I grew up in a neighborhood that was predominantly Jewish (mostly NY businessmen who moved their families here). My dad was raised Catholic, but was anti-organized religion. (He was born in the 1920s, went to a catholic school as the lid who spoke broken English and was the son of a divorced single mother.) My mom's father was Lutheran, her mother was raised Brethren (aka Amish). My mom's family celebrated Christmas with the tree and decorations and gifts until she was 10, when her oldest sister passed away. My maternal grandmother said she couldn't celebrate Christmas anymore, so they never again had any type of Christmas celebration.

My mom decided that her children would have the best Christmas' possible. She lived for Christmas, starting her shopping in January. We had the tree and gifts galore. Every gift was wrapped with care, picking the gift wrap and tag that would appeal to the recipient. (She saved the front's of Christmas cards to use as tags - the tag had to coordinate with the paper.)

She had a stack of gifts in our gallery that were pre-wrapped and had post it notes attached that told her what was in the package and a master list of extra gifts. These gifts were there for anyone who came to visit that she didn't expect and hadn't gotten a gift. There were kid gifts and young boys and girl gifts and adult gifts for men and for women. She always had something appropriate to hand to them. She took gifts to the stores where she shopped and had special relationships with some of the sales people. She had gifts for her beautician, her physician, the ladies in the ladies auxiliary, all of my dad's lab staff. She hosted the ladies auxiliary holiday luncheon and my dad's staff party, had a neighborhood open house and our family Christmas Eve gathering. She also worked with the ladies Auxiliary to provide meals and toys to the underprivileged and made sure their was a special stuffed animal and book for any child who was in the hospital at Christmas.

The Amish celebrate Christmas very modestly, the Jewish families celebrated Hanukkah, and we were Christmas central.

We did have one neighbor who was Jewish and loved Christmas. He owned Sunset Bargain Town, a store that bought factory overstocks and carried clothing and furniture and toys and groceries. Every year he closed his store the day before Christmas and had his staff load up wagons with the overstock, including turkeys and grocery items, kids clothing, coats and boots and blankets and toys and any Christmas trees or decor. As the wagons were packed they were driven through the low income neighborhoods and the contents distributed to the families who couldn't afford much for Christmas.

Every Christmas Eve he would stop by our house, still dressed in his Santa suit with reindeer antlers on the horses and give us candy canes to feed to the horses.

For me, Christmas isn't tied so much to religion, but more about spending time with family, being generous and thoughtful and caring more about others than yourself.

I don't have tons of money - can't supply a neighborhood with gifts, but I can do some small things that help make Christmas special. One of my gifts to others is that I work the week of Christmas and the week between Christmas and New Years so that my co-workers can have more time with their families.

I also took over baking the traditional Christmas Pastries that my mom baked every year and giving them to my siblings and their families. I used to get together with my sisters and sister-in-laws every year and we would schedule 1 day each weekend between Thanksgiving and Christmas to bake. My oldest sister has passed away and the other girls have bad backs and knees and wrists and just can't stand and roll out pastry dough all day. I have to spread things out, baking every weekend and a few evenings each week to get all the baking done, but I love to bake and love being able to share this memory of our childhood with my family.

I like my home decorated for Christmas. It is just me, so I don't go overboard, but I put Christmas bedding on the beds and have a small tree and a few empty decorator boxes under the tree. I should go through all the stuff I have in the basement that I no longer put out and find some homes where they can bring someone else joy. Maybe next year when I am retired.. Then again, maybe when I am retired I will have more time to decorate.

"Every year he closed his store the day before Christmas and had his staff load up wagons with the overstock, including turkeys and grocery items, kids clothing, coats and boots and blankets and toys and any Christmas trees or decor. As the wagons were packed they were driven through the low income neighborhoods and the contents distributed to the families who couldn't afford much for Christmas."

What a wonderful, generous thing to do!

Yes!!! pass the tissues….