When to take down the decorations.

Someone out there ask, when do you take the Christmas tree and decorations down? My answer was.

When I was a child, the "real" tree needed to come down before it was so dry to become a fire hazard in the house. Often it was pretty crispy by New Year's Day. Today, most people (I think) have artificial trees.

As for decorations, I remember people taking them down on "Twelfth Night." I guess this was, supposedly, 12 days after the Christ Child was born so sometime around the 5th of January. Today quite a few folks think, whoever that was that they call "Jesus" was more likely born in the Spring; rather than Winter Solstice.

Today, most people seem to leave the beautiful lights up around their houses till well into spring. Especially this far north, in Bellingham, where winter darkness is long. They are sometimes called Solstice Lights.