THEY'RE BAAAAACCKKK!!

There are standard questions you will here in Canada. Things like:
Crazy weather eh?   Or
Did ya Watch the game, eh?   Or
Eh??? (that's it, just eh???)
And starting in mid November this one starts to come into play:
Eh, have you started decorating yet?

Because we all start to rummage around in our sordid storage places, push aside whatever skeletons may be in there and pull out the bins marked "Christmas Decorations."

We have two malls in our little city. One, the Quinte Mall, is the big Kahuna. It has numerous train sets we all look forward to seeing and watch what is going on in the little settings as the trains toot by. The kids especially love it and press their little perfect noses up to the glass leaving perfect little smudges.

One year someone stuck a tyrannosaurus in there with his head hanging out a window - I thought that was awesome. 

There is another mall at the other end of town, much smaller but it also has its own unique Christmas decor. In fact, when I was 15 (that was a long time ago), I would hang out at this mall before my piano lesson killing 40 minutes or so. And there they were...staring at me...

With those beady eyes

And maniacal smirks

They used to move slowly, their little hands picking up a present and putting it down, picking up and putting down. Or stabbing something (seemed like stabbing), at a pot on a stove. 

I work in this mall....they're back every year still staring at me with those beady eyes.....

But we all have Christmas decorations we love and or hate and each year we bring them out.  

This one I hang on my door. No, I don't really want it to snow, I'm just trying to be all Canadian like

These hang around the neighbourhood and are lit up at night. They make great snow gauges! Usually they are well covered in snow (but old man winter has been very kind to us this year) and I know once I see the tips of their tails we are on the home stretch.

My original stocking - older than most of you reading this. I don't use it any more but I still pull the old girl out and hang her up.

My artistic gifting (not) was really shining through in Kindergarten when I made this paper star and plastic straw garland. It still goes on the Christmas tree, in the back, where no one can see it. 

I hope you are enjoying the season, seeing the Christmas decor, good, bad and ugly that are back every year. Or maybe you are investing in something new and snazzy. Who knows... 20 or 30 years from now someone will be looking at that once new and snazzy decoration thinking "look at those beady eyes...."