Christmas Tips

I live in a fairly normal neighborhood. The neighbors are all nice, keep their properties maintained, have normal conversations - things like that. However, the moment that December arrives, they turn into complete weirdos. I tend to think that perhaps my neighborhood has a Christmas decorating contest that I’ve never been made aware of. All of my neighbors on my block, with the exception of myself, go crazy with decorating outside. I can only imagine what their houses must look like inside. What is really strange is that almost all of the houses have a lighted Christmas decoration that is tackier than the next. Let me explain something - nice white outside lights are a good thing, a lighted Christmas decoration that can be seen for miles - not a good thing. However, my neighbors each have found the perfect lighted Christmas decoration for their homes. Directly in front of me is an 8 foot tall Santa lighted Christmas decoration that stares at my house for the entire holiday season. Beside me is a large sleigh and reindeer Christmas decoration that blinks to music. But, my personal favorite is the large house on the other side of me. They not only have one lighted Christmas decoration, but a whole yard full of them. I’m talking, lighted trees, lighted Santas, elves, reindeer, snowman, and even giant packages. Every single one of those items is a lighted Christmas decoration. Each year, I am embarrassed to have family and friends over for the holidays because they make comments on my neighborhood. However, it has also become a source of laughter and entertainment.

The best part of all of my neighbors having at least one lighted Christmas decoration is that I don’t have a need to turn my porch light on for an entire month. In fact, my hallway doesn’t even need a nightlight for the month because the light shines in nice and bright. Perhaps I save a few dollars by not having to put those lights on. I can only imagine what their electric bills must be like for the month. Heck, I can’t even imagine admitting to living at any of those tactfully lit houses. I’m not sure why people feel the need to find a lighted Christmas decoration and show it off to every passerby. Put pretty lights on your trees and shrubbery, or even your roofs. But, why the need to purchase the largest lighted Christmas decoration that you can find. Is it necessary? And if you absolutely have to have a tacky lighted Christmas decoration, or several - please don’t move into my neighborhood. I have all the holiday cheer that I can handle for the season!

On the day after Christmas last year my sister and I went bargain shopping. Neither one of us had ever gone shopping the day after Christmas so we thought it would be fun. We did not have any items to return, nor did we have a shopping list of things that we needed to get. I was hoping I would find the discount Christmas decoration bins that I had heard so much about from other shoppers. My daughter and son are both just starting out on their own so I thought I could find some decorations to get them stated for next year. We agreed to meet late in the morning and we planned to shop for a few hours and then meet our husbands for drinks and lunch at my sister’s house. We were going to bring home a pizza and watch professional football for the afternoon.

I could not believe the number of people at the mall. It took me a long time to find a parking place and I was certain that my sister would be waiting for me. I arrived at our arranged meeting place, but my sister was not there. As I was waiting for her I saw a woman walk past with a huge bag of decorations. I heard her mention that the discount Christmas decoration selection was really good this year. My sister arrived. She had a hard time finding a parking space and had to walk through most of the mall to meet me. She was excited and wanted to go back the way she came because she had seen large discount Christmas decoration bins in front of one of the higher quality department stores. She said the sign on the bins stated that the items were eighty percent off.

We made our way back to the department store. We could see the discount Christmas decoration bins and the signs, but there were so many people that we could not actually see what was in the bins. Eventually we were able to make our way to the bins. The discount Christmas decoration bins and tables still had many items on them. Most of the items were dated collectables. Neither my sister nor I collect this line of decorations, but I thought I would buy two, one for my daughter and one for my son. Maybe they would choose to start collecting the ornaments.

We spent the next hour looking at sale items and decided that we had enough shopping. We went to the grocery store and picked up snacks and a deli pizza and went to watch the football game. We decided that the discount Christmas decoration that I bought was not worth the hassle of fighting the large crowds. I doubt that we will go shopping the day after Christmas this year.