Christmas Decorating: Pinterest is Probably the Enemy

It’s December! Now that Thanksgiving is over, I give you permission to celebrate Christmas. (As if you needed it.)

It’s time to candy stripe EVERYTHING!

I’ll be completely honest – aside from our Christmas tree, the stockings, and a giant jar of colorful glass ornaments I set out by our fireplace, my Christmas decorating skills are SERIOUSLY lacking. (Exhibit A: The lovely red Christmas wreath my mother-in-law gave me two years ago… that has hung on my front door ever since. It’s now a sun-bleached kind of orange-y color? Which means it was PERFECT for Halloween.)

I look at everyone’s gorgeous Christmas decor and immediately start making a list for a visit to the local craft store. A homemade hot chocolate bar? Yes, please! DIY Christmas fabric wreaths? Easy peasy! Live greenery garlands made from our own boxwood bushes growing like crazy from all this rain? Don’t mind if I do! (#bestlaidplans)

But then we drag out our tree, untangle all seventeen strings of lights we’ve acquired over the years, hang every mismatched ornament ever collected and/or made in one concentrated spot (thanks to little kids with an intense focus and who can only reach so high), and sweep glitter off the floor. By the end of it, I’m spent.

Not to mention that most Christmases aren’t even spent in our own home, appreciating all that hard work, since we travel to see family scattered within driving distance.

So yeah, my house will never look like a page out of Southern Living. (Exhibit B: The pumpkin-themed paintings my daughter and I did as a Mother/Daughter bonding night two Octobers ago… still perched on our living room shelf.)

And sometimes it bothers me, particularly on the days leading up to Christmas when Pinterest is exploding with “Holiday Tablescapes!” and “DIY Christmas Decor!” and “1,000 Ways to Make You Feel Inadequate – with Burlap!”

But really? My kids don’t care. So I try not to care. I’m trying not to feel simultaneously bad about my lack of decorating skills and self-righteously smug that CLEARLY I’ve got more important, meaningful things to do than spray paint loose pinecones gold and arrange them in an etched glass hurricane vase. (Exhibit C: I had to Google to make sure “hurricane vase” was an actual thing and not some home decor term I made up or misheard.)

So, here’s your permission slip to care or not care about how Pinterest-worthy your house is this holiday season. To ooh and ahh over someone else’s monochromatic 9-foot tree while yours is more Charlie Brown than Martha Stewart. To be that person with the seasonal throw pillows for your artfully mismatched sofa set.

The heart of it is, we all care about the holiday season, but we show it in different ways. What’s most important to me is spending this time of year with family. So, here’s your permission slip to care about it in different, gorgeous, inspiring ways.

(As if you needed it.)

Articles You May Also Enjoy

• Creating the Picture Perfect Family Portrait
• Gather ‘Round the (Kids’) Table
• Who Gets the Kids on Thanksgiving?

Jessica Buttram parents, writes, laughs, and eats too much chocolate. She has no practical advice and zero life hacks to offer for this whole parenting gig, but she makes a mean grilled cheese sandwich, and that’s something, right? When she’s not bribing her kids with Doritos to make them sit still and snuggle for just a few minutes longer, she can probably be found vacuuming Dorito crumbs out of the couch. Her family is her whole world, except for the part that belongs to coffee. You can find her @jbuttwhatwhat and meetthebuttrams.com.