Holiday season-retail tried to rush it but I held back until after Halloween!

It seems like every year we are surprised to walk into a store and see the Halloween stuff in orange and black being marked down well before Halloween and shelved right next to the reds and greens of the Christmas season, while Thanksgiving gets a minute amount of space right between the two. Almost like Thanksgiving is a tiny barrier set up to keep the orange and black from mixing with the reds and greens. Well, I refused to even LOOK at Christmas stuff-wouldn't even acknowledge the Christmas music blaring over the speakers in a couple of shops I wandered into. I put my headphones on and enjoyed my Halloween decorations in all their dark, scary glory. LOL  I dressed up in my Steampunk finery and did my little one's Sugar Skull makeup and her dad and I took her Trick-or-Treating in a fully decorated, no holds barred neighborhood in Orlando. We had a blast!  To me, Halloween is like the buffer to the Christmas season. It's the "last hoorah" where we get to be a little self-indulgent and dress up and pretend to be what we want (I was an airship pilot! Lol) and live a little fantasy before we have to "button up" and be all stodgy and put up with the rush-rush-rush perfection that is commercialized Christmas in the 2000s. Blecchhhhhhh

That being said, the weather here in Florida is just now cooling off and it feels like fall. A nice family dinner on TG will be welcome as my Brother and his family will be closing on their new home and starting to move in so we will be cooking and carrying it all over to their place and eating as a family on their new back porch, all screened in and overlooking the horses. I will "worry" about Christmas after my turkey meal settles. We have all decided to do handmade gifts only this year so I am looking forward to needle felting, painting, making cigar box purses and making cookies. I have even started a Dr. Who TARDIS purse for Hannah-at 9 yrs old,  I think she is the biggest Dr. Who fan I've ever known. Lol

My one rule for myself on the TARDIS is that it all has to be handpainted/hand crafted. The only decals on it will be the police seal and sign. I'm not sure if the next one will be done this way, as I have since designed one that I move the hinges around on and even split the doors. But she gets the prototype, anyway! Lol Well, what is your family doing for the holiday gift giving? Love hearing new ideas and plans! Take care! ....and Happy Holidays. (She starts reluctantly.)