Dressing Up the Christmas Tree, Hassle-Free

CEBU, Philippines - The Nativity Scene, we are often told, should be the centerpiece of the Christmas season. And yet Santa Claus and the Christmas Tree remains to be very prevalent Christmas symbols. In fact many people spend the most effort decorating their Christmas Tree, which would often have a Santa Claus in its vicinity.

There's no trouble with Santa Claus; you only need to position it appropriately. But the Christmas Tree is the most challenging - and, yes, also exciting - piece to work on. We busy ourselves wrapping tinsels around it and putting everything else on it, to make it stand out.

From Balsam and Douglas firs, as practiced by the Westerners, to the local Maguey flower (Agave Cantala) here in the Philippines, decorating the Christmas Tree brings up out-of-the-box concepts every time. These past years, recycling efforts have all the more gone on a high note and many of our Christmas Trees now don things that might otherwise have long ended up in the dumps.

Jewel M. Co, furniture development manager of Living 'n Style, takes pride in customizing Christmas Tree decorations for their clients. Her team of in-house decorators are very skillful in reusing what clients already have from previous Christmases, and add some pretty new picks from their organic but elegant, stylish items at their depot and showroom in Parkmall at the North Reclamation Area in Mandaue City.

The popular fondness of Christmas Trees is evident, Co said, in increased orders this year, starting in September. Some of the items in their Christmas Village at the showroom had already begun to sell even before the start of the Advent season. They only wanted to start selling by December - but some customers were insistent.

Even some of the pieces that she wanted to keep for herself have already been taken - interesting pieces like those red barns and houses, an herd of reindeer, handcrafted jingle bells and glitzy balls from Baguio City, among others. "Everything will probably be gone before we could even the start of Misa de Gallo," she estimated.

Dressing up the Christmas Tree really comes hassle-free at Living 'n Style. Family members may still participate in dressing up their Tree, as their ideas are taken into consideration by the in-house decorators. Thus, the finished Christmas Tree is still very much their own. Living 'n Style contact numbers are: 32.2390243 and 32.3465964.  (FREEMAN)