The following essay has been written especially for Mommybloggers by Busy Mom. We want to thank her for hanging out and playing with the Mommybloggers this week.

For the longest time, I philosophically resisted the custom of decorating for Christmas immediately after Thanksgiving, but, especially since I’ve had kids, I’ve since subscribed to the “if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em” philosophy. I will admit, however, that the act of actually doing the decorating lags behind my philosphy, somewhat. I look at it as having 3 “levels” and we may implement a different level each year. In descending order of effort required, here they are:

Level III: “Full-Out Home Magazine” Mode:

We actually own more Christmas decorations than any one household should, thanks to the year we participated in a Holiday Tour of Homes (long story) and the fact that we used to host Busy Dad’s work party. We were decorating fools, and, no, it didn’t involve random placement of gingerbread men standing watch over the Baby Jesus in the manger in the front yard (not that there’s anything wrong with that, I’m just sayin’…). We ended up spending the equivalent of the GNP of a small country and way more time in a craft store than I’m comfortable with. This “over the top” decorating level included festive swags of real pine with red bows adorning the stair railings and we even decorated the upstairs, where there are, for the most part, only bedrooms and baths. Though it didn’t actually match my lofty vision created by overpriced, shiny magazines, it turned out fairly well and was most enjoyable. But, since it took nearly a month to complete and we had to bribe friends to come help us do it, it’s not practical to repeat that one very often. Friends, they have long memories, you know, and, apparently, my chili isn’t worth the manual labor. (Note to self: find new friends that weren’t involved the first time around)

Level II: “ Let’s Put Stuff in Strategic Areas Causing the Casual Observer to Think We’ve Gone All-Out” Mode:

This stage is implemented during bouts of excessive Christmas cheer but lacking the time to do anything about it. The most-used entrance to our house is the kitchen door, so we usually have the best decorated kitchen, ever, complete with lights and pine swags, etc. People never seem to leave my kitchen even when I want them to, anyway. Done properly, the kitchen decor gives the guest a first impression that we are ever so ready for Christmas to come. A smelly candle of some sort or some decoy potpourri cements the illusion and they assume that the rest of the house is the same. On the rare occasion we let people beyind the kitchen, they are escorted straight to the living room where we have implemented a rather large tree that is meant to be so fetching that you need not look around the rest of the room. This level is good because it can be rapidly executed and receives much fanfare if cdone correctly.

Level I : “I Put a Bow on the Mailbox, DoYou Think We Need To Get a Tree, Too?”:

Yes, there have been years we’ve only made it to Level I, but that was before kids. Kids make it all different and you might oughta (and you want to) do a little more.
Now that Busy Girl is older, she’s wanting to decorate beyond the boundaries and it may force me to declare some sort of new level if she passes my inspection (Control Issues: The Holiday Edition). But maybe that’s not so bad, she gets a kick out of doing it. However, I’ve been unsuccessful in my efforts to get her to specialize in the “Undecorating” Level since it’s not my favorite part. If you’re good, maybe I’ll tell you about the year we had a “St. Patrick’s Tree”.

Read more about Busy Mom and the adventure of the Busy Family on her personal blog Busy Mom