When is it too early to put up your Christmas tree?

[Artiste]

Usually, persons decorate trees after Thanksgiving, but this year stores had them up even before Thanskgiving or was or many  before Holloween ?? Why?

[serious crayons]

one friend, who is Jewish said, "My daughter really wants us to have a Christmas tree, and is annoyed that her father and I won't do it.  I wish we could go to someone's house and help them decorate their tree, and satisfy her that way." 

Not to be annoyingly negative but, while this does sound fun, isn't it possible that it would only make the daughter feel worse? She'll be hanging ornaments on someone ELSE'S tree, rather than her own. And then when she returns to her own treeless living room, she won't be able to admire it.

Maybe it depends on the personality of the actual girl. But I know my when sons were young, they really really wanted a video game system. In one of my few feeble attempts to follow the good-mom rules, I held out against it. But when they visited other people, such as my friend's son Kevin, they played with those kids' video games. Finally my older son said he didn't even want to go see Kevin anymore because it just reminded him that WE didn't have video games.

Eventually, of course, I caved. I decided that the elephant in the room of no video games had become a bigger obsession than the actual video games would be. The psychology worked perfectly on my older son. He plays a little now and then, but isn't particularly interested.

My younger son, unfortunately, is addicted to the point that I wish we'd never gotten involved in the whole mishigas.

[Ellemeno]

Not to be annoyingly negative but, while this does sound fun, isn't it possible that it would only make the daughter feel worse? She'll be hanging ornaments on someone ELSE'S tree, rather than her own. And then when she returns to her own treeless living room, she won't be able to admire it.

Maybe it depends on the personality of the actual girl. But I know my when sons were young, they really really wanted a video game system. In one of my few feeble attempts to follow the good-mom rules, I held out against it. But when they visited other people, such as my friend's son Kevin, they played with those kids' video games. Finally my older son said he didn't even want to go see Kevin anymore because it just reminded him that WE didn't have video games.

Eventually, of course, I caved. I decided that the elephant in the room of no video games had become a bigger obsession than the actual video games would be. The psychology worked perfectly on my older son. He plays a little now and then, but isn't particularly interested.

My younger son, unfortunately, is addicted to the point that I wish we'd never gotten involved in the whole mishigas.

Maybe it will just take him longer to burn out on it?

Or maybe he will be the one to make a fortune in something related to his passion for it.

And K and Chrissi, thanks for reminding me of the kind of mom I don't want to be - avoiding doing stuff because it's too much bother.  The truth is I often can enjoy stuff vicariously now.  Like I bought this big glossy coffee table book of photographs of Provence recently, and have been savoring it.  It occurred to me that I'm actually probably enjoying this enough, and my yers of yearning to go to Provence have started to diminish.  The dream and the reading about it feel like enough right now.  I used to be a big traveler.   Where was I with all this?  Oh yeah - even though I can read "The Night Before Christmas," make a box mix of gingerbread, and listen to MP3s of Christmas carols for a total of 4.2 hours this month, and call that good enough, I need to do more for my kid's childhood memories.

[serious crayons]

Or maybe he will be the one to make a fortune in something related to his passion for it.

That's what he's hoping. He aspires to become a professional video game tester. I warned him that's probably a pretty crowded field.

even though I can read "The Night Before Christmas," make a box mix of gingerbread, and listen to MP3s of Christmas carols for a total of 4.2 hours this month, and call that good enough, I need to do more for my kid's childhood memories.

I think the biggest challenge of motherhood, especially with young children, is figuring out what's "good enough."

[Penthesilea]

And K and Chrissi, thanks for reminding me of the kind of mom I don't want to be - avoiding doing stuff because it's too much bother. 

Sometimes we all avoid stuff because it's too much bother. Be it for our kids or for ourselves.
And you don't succeed or fail in being a good mother because of a Christmas tree. Or because of that one trip to a theme park you didn't take. Or because of the one or other hour you parked your kids in front of the TV to have some peace and quiet.
It's the overall attitude you show your kids. Don't be too hard on yourself.

[serious crayons]

Oh yeah - even though I can read "The Night Before Christmas," make a box mix of gingerbread, and listen to MP3s of Christmas carols for a total of 4.2 hours this month, and call that good enough, I need to do more for my kid's childhood memories.

Well, I should add to what I said that about my mom. She never read TNBC out loud (as far as I recall). She didn't make boxed gingerbread, though she may have made slice-and-bake sugar cookies (which I actually love) once or twice. She didn't play Christmas carols.

She made a turkey for Christmas dinner but complained about cooking the whole time, the broccoli side dish was a frozen unseasoned cube boiled in a saucepan, and she didn't even light candles -- going with the harsh overhead dining-room light -- until finally I got old enough to insist on something moodier. No decorations except the tree (though in later years she would have dropped that, again had I not insisted). My mom had many wonderful qualities, but she did not go all out for the holidays. Or really, for anything domestic.

And yet, despite all this, I have great childhood Christmas memories. It all works out somehow. 

[ednbarby]

It's funny how to a kid, the most dysfunctional thing is the most normal thing.  I mean, it's all you know.  When I was really young - between 3 and 5 - I have vague memories of my Mom making sugar cookies from scratch, rolling the dough out on waxed paper laid on the counter, letting me cut out the Santas and reindeer and trees.  She also bought that doughy stuff that hardened into plaster, poured it in molds, and made ornaments my brothers and I then painted.  She and my brothers picked out a real tree every year about two weeks before Christmas and we all decorated it together with entirely homemade ornaments.

By the time I was 6, that all had fallen by the wayside, and it was store-bought glass ornaments and a fake tree that looked really fake, and Banquet frozen fried chicken and Potato Buds potatoes for our Christmas dinner instead of the turkey and all the fixings she used to make.  But I have wonderful Christmas memories from then on, too.  Just different.  The point was we were all together.  Every year, she still managed to drive us around the local area the week of Christmas to look at all the outside decorations (we never put any up after I was about 5).  I still very fondly remember a couple of those drives.

[Front-Ranger]

Tree is erected here in the Rocky Mountains!!

My family went a year or two without much in the way of Christmas decorations or goodies...that's because they all sat around watching TV while I did everything. But now we're back to celebrating the holidays, with my children doing most of the work and me just appreciating and cooking. It makes sense...my son is the tallest one in the house, so he puts the ornaments on the tallest boughs.

[serious crayons]

my children doing most of the work and me just appreciating and cooking.

F-R, if you were cooking for me, I'd be willing to work for it, too! 

[brokeplex]

I put up a small one Thanksgiving Day as I had guests over for lunch. I put up the larger tree yesterday, because Dusty's little boy came into town and I wanted him to see the tree and the lights, and his gift underneath.