Witchy Woman

Luckily, most decorations associated with Christmas are Pagan in origin.

Evergreen boughs remind us that nothing ever truly dies, and can easily be spruced up (pun intended) with holly berries for the Holly King. Wrap them around stairways, mantles, and windows. Don't forget a wreath for the front door for the Wheel of the Year. Ivy is another greenery that you can festoon your home with for fertility in the coming year. Speaking of fertility, don't forget your mistletoe!

Make a Pagan nativity scene (I really want to do this, but don't have time this year. Maybe next).

Candles everywhere! You'll most likely be making and blessing new ones for Imbolc, anyway, so why not use up the old ones? It's dark and dreary, and what better way to celebrate the festival of light? However, do use common sense and only burn them in containers in safe places out of the reach of children, pets, and other gremlins. Traditionally the colours would be red, green, white, blue, silver, or gold, but you can use any you like. For extra light, put them in front of mirrors and/or windows.

Display your Yule log before burning it.

Hang bells everywhere, especially on doors, for good fortune.

Santa Claus is Pagan in origin, and I prefer the traditional type of Father Christmas in the robes. Although I would recommend leaving out the modern concept of elves out of respect for the fae.

Don't forget potpourri! Cinnamon and pine scents are long-lasting, inexpensive, and festive.

Now for the easiest and hardest part, the tree. There are some commercial ornaments out there, but they can be fairly expensive and/or poorly made. Many of them I look at and think, "I can make that." If you are crafty, you can make your own ornaments.

Here is a list of common stores and companies that use "Holiday" and those that say "Christmas." Hopefully, you can support local businesses instead of big box stores, but not all of us can afford to, especially in this economy. They are categorized according to their websites, as I don't watch nearly as much live TV as I used to (oh TiVo, how I love thee).

Crate and Barrel (see Home Depot)

Home Depot tries to trick you with a Holiday section divided into Christmas or Hanukkah

K-Mart (second year in a row, at least that I know of)

Sears

Target

Wal-Mart (no surprise there)

Amazon, only mention of any holiday is for shipping by Christmas

Big Lots

Fred Meyer, main page has Holiday but ads and products all say Christmas

Frye's, no mention of anything, not even Winter

JC Penney, uses both

Nordstrom, one instance of Christmas and then tries to use Winter everywhere else

Office Depot, no mention of anything, not even Winter

Ross, one instance of Winter

Winco, tries to use Holiday but reverts to Christmas

Barnes and Noble (but Powell's is better)

Best Buy

Borders (Powell's is much more betterer)

Kohl's, primarily Holiday with a Christmas Sale

Lowe's (second year in a row)

Petco (hey, even our familiars need gifts)

Powell's, but we already knew they're awesome

To bust out the Solstice Carols! My favourite site is Willow Firesong's because there are so many, and they aren't anywhere near as bad as my recent filk attempt.

Let's start off with a heartwarming tale of terrorist threats. I love how they use the term "blasphemous" when the modern trappings of Christmas originated from us "filthy" Pagans.

Defend Christmas is an interesting website that isn't necessarily what it sounds like. It's obviously run by Christians and includes ways of making sure that "Christmas" isn't completely stamped out of public life. I do not agree with everything that they say, but they do emphasize not shoving it down other peoples' throats and how to include everyone else. While their agenda does make me uneasy, it is nice to see a non-rabid example of the War on Christmas rhetoric.

First of all, only 89% of the donated money goes towards charity work, which is pretty standard, actually. The rest goes towards funding their other... projects. This is why I find other charities to donate to, and then they wonder why donations are down.

Some alternatives are:

Local food banks

While these organizations may not be perfect, they don't have an agenda... that I know of.

Sorry about that, folks. I lost my job and my mind there for a little while. So until I get back into the swing of things, here's a cute little article for you to enjoy.

The cutesy little commercials and signs and even storefronts (guess where I won't be shopping) that say, "Remember, Jesus is the reason for the season" irritate me to no end.

Don't you remember anything from grade school science? The tilt of the earth's axis is the reason for the season.

Christians don't get to monopolize an entire season. They don't even get to claim the entire month of December. There's Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, Yule, Bodhi Day, and in Islam there's either Eid ul-Fitr or Al-Hijra depending on their calendar.

Jesus is not the reason for the season. He's the reason for your holiday of Christmas, for which you stole the practices and traditions of Pagans. Get over yourselves.

In case you haven't noticed, the Holiday Season is emminent. The songs are already on the radio. And it bugs me every time I hear the word "Christmas" in the music, which I actually do like. I feel like I'm being beaten over the head with it: "You are the weird one for not following a holiday which has been twisted and commercialized from its original meaning on another holiday that has been plagiarized from your religion." Yeah, I gots issues. And Pagan versions of songs will most likely never be played on the radio, at least, not in my lifetime.

But I did realize in my singing along to the radio (don't worry, no one was present for the audial atrocity committed) that "Solstice" and "Christmas" rhyme. So I substitued Solstice accordingly. It's only taken me six years to figure that one out. Yes, I are teh genius.

This website has some good Pagan-friendly versions of carols. Such as using "Yuletide" in "Have a Holly, Jolly Christmas." I figure it's only fair to use Christian carols since they did co-opt our holiday first.

According to some, those of us who don't celebrate Christmas are actively against it. Fine. You want to declare war, go right ahead. But I will vote with my dollars and boycott any companies that say outright, "Merry Christmas" instead of "Happy Holidays." I never really cared before, but I never realized that perhaps some companies do so out of some weird spiteful "We only want Christians shopping here and if you don't like that then you're against Christmas" sort of attitude.

Actually, I do celebrate Christmas secularly with my family. (I'm still in the broom closet with them. Would that mean that I'm keeping them in the broom closet? Wouldn't that be elder abuse?) But I also celebrate Yule religiously. So I can't have two happy holidays? I can only have one? What about New Year's? Or because I don't drink and therefore won't spend my money on booze then you don't care and say, "Screw you, hippy." But I digress in my rantings.

As we wade into the holidays, I mean, battlefield I will list companies that use "Merry Christmas" in their advertising versus "Happy Holidays." I'm not telling you where to shop and who to boycott. I'm just letting you know in case you give a rat's arse.

Merry Christmas: K-Mart

Jerry's Home Improvement has "Christmas Trees"

Lowe's in one of their commercials, the employee says "Merry Christmas" but the announcer/flash of words at the end says "Happy Holidays"

Happy Holidays: Crest (while "I'll be home for Christmas" plays in the background)

Kohl's