the Christmas police
I am firm about Christmas and its rightful place in the seasonal calendar.
Christmas decorations, recipes, music, movies, and all other general forms of holiday merriment can (and should) be enjoyed to the utmost during the month of December.
However, breaking them out before Thanksgiving not only undermines the legitimacy of the national day of gratitude, it also makes it all the more likely that everyone will be sick of Christmas stuff by the time Dec. 25 rolls around--thus devaluing Christmas itself.
We have our Christmas lights up now. But that's allowed, because we didn't put them up until after Thanksgiving.
This is my Christmas manifesto, and I'm sticking to it. I'm not a grinch, I swear...but I am kind of the Christmas police. The secret Christmas police, that is. Stores, restaurants, or houses that break this personal taboo of mine are likely to be mocked...but only from the safety of my own car or house, where the perpetrators are not able to actually hear me.
My girls have fully adopted my militant Christmas views. What they haven't mastered yet is the secret part. Rather than keeping their scorn to themselves, my girls voice their disapproval of early decorators loud and clear.
And, since stores seem to decorate earlier and earlier these days, it seems that every trip to the store for the last month has gone something like this:
We get out of the car and into the store, where we pass through the doors and are greeted by Frosty the Snowman displays, faux pine boughs, and "Jingle Bells" blaring on the store sound system.
Girls: Christmas stuff! Already? It's not even Thanksgiving yet!
Me: Yes, well, some people like to decorate early.
Girls, glaring at store employees: Don't these people know it's not time to decorate for Christmas yet? You CAN'T decorate for Christmas before Thanksgiving!
Me: Girls, talk more quietly please.
Girls, pointing at large seasonal displays: But Mom! They have Santa Claus pictures everywhere. And it's not even December! These silly people are doing it WRONG!
And so I slink my way through the store, hearing my own critical views coming back out of the mouths of my own babes, at full volume.
But now, thank goodness, Thanksgiving has passed, December has rolled around, and I am ready to embrace the season. Now instead of complaining about the holiday decor, we can freely oooh and aaaah over ever single reindeer, angel, and candy cane we pass.
The Christmas police are retired. For this year.
Christmas decorations, recipes, music, movies, and all other general forms of holiday merriment can (and should) be enjoyed to the utmost during the month of December.
However, breaking them out before Thanksgiving not only undermines the legitimacy of the national day of gratitude, it also makes it all the more likely that everyone will be sick of Christmas stuff by the time Dec. 25 rolls around--thus devaluing Christmas itself.
We have our Christmas lights up now. But that's allowed, because we didn't put them up until after Thanksgiving.This is my Christmas manifesto, and I'm sticking to it. I'm not a grinch, I swear...but I am kind of the Christmas police. The secret Christmas police, that is. Stores, restaurants, or houses that break this personal taboo of mine are likely to be mocked...but only from the safety of my own car or house, where the perpetrators are not able to actually hear me.
My girls have fully adopted my militant Christmas views. What they haven't mastered yet is the secret part. Rather than keeping their scorn to themselves, my girls voice their disapproval of early decorators loud and clear.
And, since stores seem to decorate earlier and earlier these days, it seems that every trip to the store for the last month has gone something like this:
We get out of the car and into the store, where we pass through the doors and are greeted by Frosty the Snowman displays, faux pine boughs, and "Jingle Bells" blaring on the store sound system.
Girls: Christmas stuff! Already? It's not even Thanksgiving yet!
Me: Yes, well, some people like to decorate early.
Girls, glaring at store employees: Don't these people know it's not time to decorate for Christmas yet? You CAN'T decorate for Christmas before Thanksgiving!
Me: Girls, talk more quietly please.
Girls, pointing at large seasonal displays: But Mom! They have Santa Claus pictures everywhere. And it's not even December! These silly people are doing it WRONG!
And so I slink my way through the store, hearing my own critical views coming back out of the mouths of my own babes, at full volume.
But now, thank goodness, Thanksgiving has passed, December has rolled around, and I am ready to embrace the season. Now instead of complaining about the holiday decor, we can freely oooh and aaaah over ever single reindeer, angel, and candy cane we pass.
The Christmas police are retired. For this year.
5 comments:
Do you know what's really disturbing? There is a house on our street that put their Christmas tree up the day after Halloween. I almost wrecked my car driving by on my way to work. RIDICULOUS!!!
I'm with you. Luckily my boys aren't observant enough or they just don't listen to me when it comes to decorating to early.
I generally agree, but I have to politely disagree with Thanksgiving being the marker of when to start celebrating because it's a floating holiday. At a minimum, Christmas needs four solid weeks. When Thanksgiving is late like it was a few years ago, then there's only 25 days (and a pitiful three weekends) until Christmas which is just bad news all the way around. It's way too frantic.
On the upside, it is good for the economy to have Christmas shopping starting earlier (not relevant for me since I shop late anyway). I love Thanksgiving, but it's market value is pretty low :)
I totally agree with you. I won't even listen to Christmas music until after Thanksgiving. We did, however put UP our Christmas lights right before Thanksgiving, because you NEVER know what the weather is going to be like in Michigan day-to-day and Ryan was on the roof cleaning the gutters AND it's new house and he wanted to make sure he would have some extra time to fix any issues if they arose. ON the note, we did not turn them on until Dec. 1! I used to work retial and the day after Halloween we'd put out Christmas stuff. and then there was the non-stop Christmas music. Seriously? 4 versions of jingle bells in a row? Is that necessary? It took YEARS to recover from that and I will never work retail again just because it ruined Christmas for me! We probably will get our tree this weekend though and we do keep it up til after Christmas! Have a Merry one!
You are an excellent parent!
Oh and I like your new look on your blog.
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