KAREN WIGHT -- No place like home

The spiders and I are joined in an ongoing battle for custody of the

front door. It seems that as soon as I clear out the cobwebs, wipe off

the door and debug the light fixture, the next round of arachnids and

insects are moving in.

When guests come to my front door, I’d like to be the one welcoming

them, not the creepy crawlies that lurk on the porch. I’m not sure I will

ever win the battle of the bugs at the front door, but I can meet and

greet our friends with the best intentions.

I think the front door is a great place to announce the seasons and

other significant holidays and occasions. Over the years, our front door

has seen a lot of action. We started with the obligatory green wreath for

our first married Christmas, and since then the whole front door theme

has taken on a life of its own.

The front door has announced babies with appropriately colored

balloons and ribbons. We announce birthdays with a large (empty) package

festively dressed and hung on the door. Gifts from the garden are hung

upside down from a cup hook permanently attached above the cut lights.

Laminated children’s artwork announces certain holidays. A skeleton

claims the door as home for Halloween.

I think the sky is the limit for front door decorations. My only

requirement is that it’s slightly weird and unusual. I’m not a big dried

flower wreath girl. Too predictable. I’d rather put a hanging sconce with

drippy candles on the front door to announce a dinner party. It’s out of

the norm, but then, maybe we are, too.

The Christmas evergreen wreath was replaced long ago with a

needlepoint wall hanging that belonged to one of my grandmothers. It’s a

little kitschy, but that makes it all the better.

I like kitsch. It’s fun, shallow and whimsical. I have been known to

hang plastic lobsters on the front door for a luau. That’s kind of tacky.

But tacky and kitschy -- they’re related, aren’t they?

One of my favorite fall decorations is a dried pod wreath made by the

kids in their third-grade class. Mrs. White, the teacher, was famous for

her autumn artwork. We collected goodies weeks ahead of time and shared

the bounty with the class. These wreaths (we have two) bring a smile to

everyone’s face when we bring them out of the closet.

Halloween is the most fun holiday for decorations. We don’t get

serious-scary, but there is something so fun about stretching fake spider

webs everywhere. Maybe I like this holiday because it is the only time of

the year that I don’t feel like I have to do bug duty with the front

door. At Halloween, the more spiders, the merrier.

In addition to the fake spiders that nest on a very large fake web,

the real things are free to be at home for a couple weeks, and the bug

survival rate around the house increases exponentially.

Just to complicate the decoration of the front door, last year I added

a wall fountain to the front entry. I intended for there to be running

water in it, but we had so much fun putting “stuff” in the basin that we

haven’t put the pump or the water in yet.

Back to school gets a bag full of apples. October is a great time to

fill it with mini pumpkins. Thanksgiving finds the papier-mache’ turkeys

nesting in it. At Christmas, it gets filled with gold and silver

ornaments.

The kids think I get out of control with my seasonal announcements,

but deep down I think they like it. It’s fun for them to come home and

find the front door laden with red Chinese fans and paper lanterns. It

lets them know that something special is in the air.

And now that I’ve taken time to analyze this, maybe it’s my subtle way

of saying that their mean, strict mom still has an element of fun left in

her old bones. We can all celebrate the innocence of childhood even if we

do have to wipe away the cobwebs every now and then.

* KAREN WIGHT is a Newport Beach resident. Her column runs Saturdays.