jane says. how early is too early?

Last week, I passed a sign that screamed at me to buy my firewood NOW. It wasn’t even Halloween and it was 76 degrees in Washington, DC, and well, just no. Then again, as I write this, it’s now November, the geraniums on my porch are in full bloom and it is, again, 76 degrees. So, just no to that too.

I’m not sure where this leaves us, but for starters, I saw my first holiday commercial shortly after Labor Day, so we are clearly going in the wrong direction here. We can probably all agree that holiday-anything right after Labor Day is insane. But as we get into Fall, things get murkier, including that very rife-with-feelings question of how early is too early to start the holiday decorating (cue the outrage here).

I have many feels about this as well. For decades I sat stubbornly in the strict traditionalist camp: absolutely not a single Christmas thing until the day after Thanksgiving (for those who do not celebrate, save yourself from this madness and skip to the end) and only after all pumpkin spice had been eliminated from the earth. In the meantime, however, the world kept getting more stressful, more complicated and more overwhelming. In addition to being a stupid hill to die on, these rules also delayed all the joy that comes with the holiday season, no matter what or how you celebrate. Add in the multi-state diplomacy of growing families, and the holidays now require algorithmic planning, extreme flexibility and a not-insubstantial amount of wine.

This brings me to the actual point of this post, which is: you are the only one who gets a vote, so do what makes you happy. For me, because I always host Thanksgiving, that now includes decorating my house early, so that when my loved ones (as well as randoms, because we are a Friendsgiving household) walk through the door, they feel as warm and cozy and festive as possible and we can celebrate all the things.

Sure, this requires some creative editing but that’s the fun part, right? The trick is to choose things that carry you from one holiday to the next (start after Halloween, though, because spiders and ghouls aren’t that festive). Now I skip the oranges and pumpkin-everything and lean on themes that work for the whole season: fresh greens, brass, lots of candlelight and natural textures like wood, linen and maybe a little velvet. You can set your dining room table in a way that says holiday with a lower-case h and then add in whatever appropriate magic you want. What's even better is that this way, nothing has to come down the morning after so you can hit the snooze button at least once, depending on the age of your children.

Your home, holidays or not, should be your sanctuary and you get to make the rules. Trends, socials and all those catalogs clogging your mailbox don’t get a vote. If you know what makes you smile the minute you walk through the door, just do it. If you can’t quite put your finger on it, that’s what I’m here for. Your designer is your guide, not your boss.

I’m not going to end by wishing you happy holidays because it’s still too damn early, but you get the point. What I can say now is what we say in my beloved home state of New Jersey: Happy Turkey.

Even if you’re in shorts.