Tailor of Clouds

The first thing that's cropping up in my need to downsize is the winter holidays.
Halloween is my favorite holiday of the whole year. I have lots of decorations and I love putting them up. I don't even mind taking them down; I take my time, and get to touch each one again, and that feels good.

The problem comes in that when it's over, and the pumpkins haver served their November purpose, the last thing I want to do is decorate for Yule. Pulling out the tree and fluffing and lighting it (my children's dad is allergic to pine, so fake tree it is). unwrapping the decorations and hanging them, all the outside decorations and inside decorations, and the knowledge that it's only a couple weeks until it all has to come back down just drains me. We wait until after my son's December birthday party to decorate, which means I'm watching everyone on Facebook and in the neighborhood put up their decorations, while not doing mine.

This year, with things falling through the cracks by the handful, I just couldn't make myself face it.

After checking with the children that not having our usual bigger tree wouldn't bother them, I went to Aldi during a sale and bought a tiny two foot tree for $4; decorated with the small ornaments I, conveniently, didn't put away last year, hung with striped red and green paperclips from my drawer so I didn't have to dig out my ornament hooks. I bought new electric candles from them for $1 each that have a timer in them and run on batteries. No worrying about where to plug them in in a house full of devices, and no having to remember to turn them on and off. Also they flicker, so that's just a win. I bought a tiny string of white lights and hung them through my house plant that sits in the front window, so I could have my "tree lights" in the window without moving half the furniture in the office half of the living room. One short string of colored lights and a fake white poinsettia garland with pinecones went on the front porch, and boom. Holiday decorations. The tiny tree is on the dining table surrounded by the gifts. I wrapped those mostly in paper, because it feels more festive to me. But all the paper had either been purchased from the thrift store, found as a curb score, or saved from previous years by carefully removing them from the presents they first wrapped. I don't do bows. A poinsettia in the living room, and one in the kitchen complete the decorations.

It's working for me and I find I"m only missing one thing; the ornaments made by my mother and grandma. Those are packed away and they certainly wont' fit on my tiny tree.
Then I remembered that when the kids were teeny, I would string fake garland along the beam on our high ceiling living room and hang them from that. I got rid of the garland once they were old enough not to drag things off our tree, but there isn't any reason I couldn't get some garland during this year's Christmas clearance sales and hang them along the living room wall next year to hold those ornaments where I will see them all the time.

This is downsizing on two fronts; my obligations and efforts, and the amount of things I"ll need to store all year for 2-3 weeks of decorating time. I've missed the window for selling ornaments and trees, but that just means I have plenty of time to go through all the Yule things this coming year and then put them up for sale November 1st next year to find them a good home. Which also means I have time to get through this year's burnout and see if next year I want all the things again and this was just a temporary exhaustion.

It can be hard to deal with breaking tradition. The tree in the window, the ornaments on it, the act of trimming the tree with the kids, etc, but I find that as my illnesses advance, and gain new additions, sometimes I have to find the strength to put aside the habits and expectations that are more doable with a more functional body or budget.

We'll see where this ends up, but for this year, the decorations feel just about right.