Getting to Christmas always feels like a marathon. So much to do to get everything ready before the arrival of family to spend a few days with us. I put a lot of time into baking Christmas cakes, cleaning and decorating the house. This takes a lot longer than most people would consider acceptable, because over the years my Christmas decorations have become my ‘thing’: my collection. It’s fair to describe this collection as sizeable. (Some might say excessive, but what do they know?!)

Unwrapping my ornaments each December is like being reunited with old friends. I read an article just before Christmas, about different approaches to tree decorating. I recognised myself as ‘the archivist’. Every piece has a story, or invokes a memory. Some were made by my children when they were little; quite a lot have been (and continue to be) made by me. Others were gifts, or bought by us on our travels. A few belonged to my parents; and even the ones that fall into none of those categories often have meaning.

I follow my mother’s tradition of leaving the decorations up until 6th January (Epithany), and my favourite time is the days between Christmas day and then, when everything looks beautiful and we can enjoy the results of all that preparation.

These ‘Twelve Days of Christmas’ would have been enjoyed long ago by our ancestors who, taking advantage of the dormant winter season, followed the proclamation of the 567 Council of Tours, that the twelve days from Christmas to Epiphany were to be kept as a sacred and festive season. This short video focuses on some of the traditions that may be new to overseas readers, but many of them are still present in some way in UK festivities.

For me, these are mostly quiet days, but we do like to have a gathering on Twelfth Night (5th January).

Although I consider the end of the Twelve Days as the day to take down the Christmas decorations, the tradition used to be to leave them up until the Eve of Candlemas on 2nd February. I inadvertently fell into this tradition when, in 2021, after the 2020 Christmas Covid lockdown, I needed to keep the joy going a bit longer. That year, on January 6th, I re-dressed one of my trees as a ‘January Tree’, removing all the Christmassy ornaments, but keeping bright reds and wintery decorations. Two years later I had my first little Christmas ‘Family Tree’ and ever since, I keep both of these trees throughout January every year.

If you celebrate Christmas, I hope you’ve had a happy one. If you needed quiet and tranquility, I hope you had that. If parties and community are your thing, I hope you enjoyed as many as you wanted. To all of you, I wish you a happy, healthy and successful New Year in 2026. I’ll be back in January with a new post.