Silent Night, Howly Night

Okay, not really, but how'd you do it? I'm still working on quilts that have to be shipped to Ohio in three days to make it in time! Not to mention my house is a disaster. Thank goodness we're not hosting this year.

One point of contention in my household this year was the icicle tinsel my husband loves and I usually do too - except that last year I was still vacuuming it out of the carpets at Easter. I put my foot down this year and told him either it only goes on the top three feet of the tree or it doesn't go on at all.

It's still not on the tree yet, although we do still have several large tubs of ornaments yet to cram on the poor thing this year. (We have an eight-foot artificial tree and I think our ornament collection has outgrown it.)

The dogs have been wonderful this year. So far, no ornament casualties. My rule is that the "expendable" ornaments -- the plain glass balls, the "cheap" plastic ornaments, the satin balls, etc. occupy the bottom two feet of the tree (AKA "Tail Territory") while the Hallmark ornaments (I collect) and the other irreplaceables go on the top. My tinsel rule was imposed not only to keep me from having to dig it out of my vacuum's beater bar this year, but to keep it out of the dogs' mouths. Don't forget that those waving, shiny strands of plastic can be deadly to pets that ingest it. (The lucky ones manage to poop it out, leaving your yard and litter box marked with weird holiday gifts.)

Our dogs all have little stockings in which "Santa" will give them something out of the ordinary. (We save this until the night before for obvious reasons.)

We didn't put up as many exterior lights as we usually do but that's only because many of them were still up from last year. (And many of them still worked!) Be careful with your outside decoration placements and supervise your pets while they are outside. Not only could chewing on an electrical cord be dangerous to your pet, a frayed cord plugged in could cause a fire. The same goes for inside lights. Try to place cords away from the reach of curious pets, or even purchase one of those electrical cord floor covers from an office supply store. You know the ones I'm talking about, the ones that you're always tripping over at work that are put down to keep you from tripping over the cords they're covering.

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