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DNS FOG Temp: 33 °F Wind: CLM at 0 mph Saturday, December 7, 2002 SECTIONS Home Page Local News Sports Business Obituaries Life Opinion - Politics AP News Weather Classified Archives Site Map EXTRA HomeLife Magazine W3 Magazine Jobs @ Mail Tribune Tempo A & E Oregon CarZone Wellness Connection Real Estate Newspaper in Education Prime Times Outdoor Journal Personals Movie Times TV Times E The People CLASSIFIEDS Find a Car Find a Home Find a Job Find Everything E SOUTHERN OREGON Automotive Communities Entertainment Publications Recreation Calendar ABOUT US FAQ What's New Advertise Home Delivery Classified Ad Contact Us Media Kit Email Story to a Friend November 25, 2002 Don Schmidt of Medford has started putting up his Christmas decorations, centered around the theme of Santa's elves getting ready for the holiday season. Mail Tribune / Roy Musitelli A jump-start on Christmas The traditional courtesy of waiting until after Thanksgiving to put up Christmas lights seems to be fading in the Rogue Valley, either because residents just can’t wait or are too busy to delay By MARK FREEMAN Mail Tribune The day after Don Schmidt of Medford closed the door on his last Halloween trick-or-treater, he started his annual homage to Christmas. Out of storage and onto his lawn came the 4-foot-tall candy canes, fake snow and, of course, the elves. Singing elves. Climbing elves. Working elves. Parachuting elves. And his favorite — a Teamster elf, holding a strike sign in his right hand and a fishing rod in his left. "People think I’m weird for starting early," Schmidt says. "But it’s not by choice. It’s by necessity. It takes me three or four weekends to get all this stuff up." The advent of Christmas comes almost two months early for the Rogue Valley’s most seasoned holiday decorators, who, like Schmidt, don’t bother waiting for the sun to set on turkey day before turning on the yuletide lights. The old pre-Thanksgiving moratorium on Christmas lights is getting more and more pass� among people either too busy or too smitten by Christmas to wait. While Oregonians may have become accustomed to department stores hawking Christmas gifts in October, some still cry humbug to Christmas in November. "Nobody here turns Christmas lights on until after Thanksgiving," says Bob Crews of Greystone Court, Medford’s most well-known and well-lit street during the holidays. "It’s the Thanksgiving season, not the Christmas season." In Jim Blower’s case, it’s not so much that he’s early with hanging Christmas lights this year. He’s actually late from last year. Very late. "I just never took them down last year," says Blower, a 37-year-old day-care provider. Icicle lights hung exactly a year ago this weekend still dangle from the peak of his Portland Avenue home in Medford, and several strands still spell out Ho-Ho-Ho on his roof. "The roof is so slick, and I have to carry a 20-foot ladder from all the way over there to here," says Blower, gesturing from one side of his house to the other. "Truthfully, it’s a pain taking them down." Blower says he intended to de-light his house last winter. And again in the spring. But by mid-summer, he figured he officially was just early for this Christmas instead of being late for last. "In July, I threw my hands up and said, that’s it," he says. But Blower is just a rookie compared to Stephanie Larson. Larson last hung Christmas lights on their Shady Cove home five years ago. They’ve never come down, but she does manage to unplug the extension cord every January. De-lighting the house just never ranks high enough on the homestead to-do list, says Larson, who insists the perpetual shrine to Christmas 1997 is not her fault. "It’s not my responsibility to do it," she says. "My husband doesn’t do it, so there they sit." As for Schmidt, he always breaks out the plywood elf cut-outs just after Halloween and slowly adds to his display until all the props and the 25,000 lights turn his Bristol Court house into a Space Shuttle beacon by Christmas. "My neighbors have gotten used to it," says Schmidt, a 44-year-old former truck driver. "People like to come by and watch me put it up, especially the kids. And that’s what they’re here for, anyway. The kids." Reach reporter Mark Freeman at 776-4470, or e-mail [email protected] Printer Friendly Version Email Story to a Friend Subscribe Archive: Click to Search Mail Tribune Home Local News | Sports | Business | Obituaries | Life Opinion - Politics | AP News | Archives | Site Map E Southern Oregon | Classified Copyright 1997-2002 Mail Tribune. All rights reserved. Privacy Policy webmaster feedback A D V E R T I S E R S