I can't believe I'm writing this...a blog is supposed to be uplifting and lighthearted and not cranky. But today I am cranky. And here's why -

Why do retailers always put out the Christmas decorations right after Labor Day? Why are Columbus Day, Halloween, Veterans" Day, and Thanksgiving given such short shrift? I realize, especially given the economy right now, that the retailers are looking for any way to increase (or at least match the year before) their income, but, HEY FOLKS! Let's not rush into the season before we've even gotten 'fed-up' with the Thanksgiving turkey leftovers.

We have traditionally taken the decorations out of the attic and put them up all around the house the 2nd week in December and taken then down on January 1st. I've seen some houses with their holiday decorations already up before Halloween. And they'll probably stay up till Little Christmas or later.

I'm making a concession to the season at the bottom of this post. We haven't taken the decorations down from the attic yet...and we probably won't till next week sometime. I'm not going to wear my Christmas vest till the week of December 21st. Nor will I answer my phone with a cheery, "Merry Christmas" till that week. I'll be diligently working on getting the cards done before the 15th...maybe before the 22nd (?) And I hope no one takes offense. I'm not anti-Christmas - I'm anti-decorating-before-Thanksgiving!

On that note, I leave you with the following:

Does This Look Like Fall to You?

I was driving home from work the other day, and it began to dawn on me that this isn't even the middle of November. All the trees should still have leaves on them and some might even have color left. But NO! The majority of the landscape around here, in the middle of the Ozarks, looks like this!

This is the view out my back deck. Yes, there are a few cedar trees, those are evergreens and don't lose their leaves. But most of the trees are barren of leaves....just naked!

I suppose with the plethora of fabric I own, I could probably make muumuus for all the trees and still have some left...you quilters out there know what I'm talking about. But that takes time, especially with the number of trees that populate the woods on our property. Time that I simply do not have - Christmas is coming, you know! And I've not stated on my sewing, knitting, quilting projects for this year.

I guess I could maybe learn PhotoShop really quickly and paint leaves back on the picture so at least I might be the only one to know my trees are buck-naked...since rarely do we have visitors from California, Rhode Island, Arizona, etc. , (You know who you are!) and you'd never know if we had leaves on the trees or not.

Or, I could just ignore those poor naked trees and get on with Thanksgiving and Christmas...it will be spring soon enough, I suppose!

Have a great weekend, folks. It's supposed to rain on Sunday here so we are driving to Fort Leonard Wood to shop for groceries - our once every 8 weeks date!

Thanks for stopping by.