The Twelve Staging Tips of Christmas

In the spirit of the season, and as a nod to a famous Yuletide song, I thought I'd offer up twelve tips during this Christmas season--one a day. As I said before Thanksgiving, it can be quite difficult to live on a stage during the holidays, especially if children live in the house. Sellers need all the help they can get, and I hope these tips will make your seasonal stage go as smoothly as possible.

Tip, the First

Choose a specific color scheme to unify your decorations. I grew up in a house where all sorts of ornaments and decorations were displayed together, regardless of the style (homemade vs. heirloom) or color. While this certainly made for a festive and colorful holiday, it failed to convey a unifying theme.

This year, purchase a tree that is truly in scale with the room (often people tend to buy a larger tree than the space should hold), use white lights, and decorate the tree with a decided color scheme. You can choose gold and red, blue and silver, green and white, silver and gold--whatever scheme you like. Just make sure that all the ornaments and decorations reinforce the scheme.

Here are some inexpensive ways to carry a holiday color scheme throughout the house without breaking the bank.

• Most Christmas tree lots will give away the extra branches that they cut off the bottoms of trees. Use these--they're free.
• A bowl of simple glass or satin balls make a simple and elegant decoration. Depending on the size of the bowl, you can use it as a centerpiece or even in the powder room.
• Purchase some inexpensive fabric and some fusible tape and make an inexpensive custom runner for your dining table, end tables or sideboard.
  
• Tie ribbons that match your color scheme around the bases of your candles.
• Place a branch or two of evergreen in a tall vase. Accent with colored ribbons, beads, glass or satin balls or glittery vines from a craft store. Place on the mantel or on a side table.