Holiday decor!

[VisionofMilotic]

Will your Christmas tree and stockings stay up until Epiphany and round out the twelve days of Christmas? Maybe you have a Kinara lit tonight for the second day of Kwanzaa? Perhaps you will be throwing a New Year's Eve party and are making ready with the confetti, champagne and noisemakers? Birthday party decorations count too.

This is a thread about festive decor. If you have any then tell us all about it, share photos if you'd like.

I have a Christmas tree in my living room that I call Mother Ginger, as a reference to The Nutcracker. She is the star of the home, stuffed with as many ornaments as I could fit on her.

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[Roni]

here where i live we got a bunch of these "parols" which are basically stars made out of cheap plastics and metals and are hung around houses to add some spice to the usual wreaths and ribbons and whatnot. they can go from something as simple as these:

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to as extravagant as these:

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as you can tell the latter is way more expensive, and is usually seen hanging by rich people's houses. my family's always rocked the former ones and just stuck a couple xmas lights next to them for some DIY flair. we love simplicity and affordability! in the future i'd be down to learn how to build these myself.

 

[Corrin]

We have cats.
You can probably see where I'm going. less is more.

 

[Sheep]

My parents usually put some cute lights up outside of our house each xmas, but since I'm not home this year I can't take pictures. Partner and I didn't decorate at all (didn't get a tree either), so it was a very...non-christmassy christmas aha. Your tree is so pretty Sam!!

 

[VisionofMilotic]

We have cats.
You can probably see where I'm going. less is more.

I outfoxed the cat this year, and designed my Christmas tree as cat-proof. I put the ornaments that were the most delicate like the glass ones at the top of the tree so they would be harder to reach, I also pushed them back as far back on the branches at they could fit, requiring more effort to tear them off. I learned this lesson after a series of shattered baubles from last year's tree.

Dangling down at the bottom of the tree is where I hung mostly the plastic, wooden, tin and fabric ornaments this time. Since they wouldn't break easily I let them be the first infantry line. The cat would have to scratch and claw through them to get to the more valuable stuff, and anything he took down wouldn't be serious injury, they could be put back where they were. I also made a barricade of Christmas presents around the front of the tree to impede him further.

There was some space to squeeze through the gifts towards the back of the tree, but I hung no ornaments there, so the joke was on him.

I also strategically left old ornaments as decoys for the cat. I took cheap balls that didn't have the strings or hooks attached to them anymore to hang from the tree, then placed them near the tree to catch the cat's attention and distract him whenever he was on his way there. This diversion worked! When he spotted one of my pawns he batted them around with his paws, rolled them across the hardwood floors and chased them all around the house, thinking he had taken back trophies, little did he know that those brave little ornaments were willing sacrifices in the name of the greater good.

I did very well in my battle against the cat this year. He only managed to take one ornament down from the tree- an artificial poinsettia flower that I had looped back on the tree in 1 second flat.

Round 1 goes to me. I beat the cat at his own game!

 

[professor plum]

hi hi please note i didn't do any of the decorating/wrapping, it was all richard. he's very......particular

 

[Dusk]

We usually start taking down the Christmas decorations after New Year's whenever we have the time off so not necessarily a particular day. Pretty Christmas trees @ Sam and Tyler. We have pets... but the cat only slept under the tree on the tree skirt the first day. After that it was the dumb dog's napping spot. It's an artificial tree so sometimes he would knock down a bottom branch.