Don’t get me wrong, I absolutely love Christmas. It’s by far my favorite holiday. I love driving down snow-lined streets with “It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas” playing on the radio, looking at houses completely decked out in lights and decorations, putting up ornaments on our tree, drinking eggnog or hot chocolate, seeing my family and going gift shopping and watching people open gifts. I love every part of the holiday. Except for the fact that it’s highly commercialized and it completely overshadows Thanksgiving.

I never understood, and still can’t understand, how stores can go from having Halloween decorations on their shelves one day, and then the second Halloween is over have Christmas thrown up everywhere. It’s like people completely forget about the holiday in between. Thanksgiving is such an important holiday to celebrate — it’s all about giving thanks for what we have and spending time eating delicious food with family and friends. Plus, for my family, it’s even welcoming anyone who doesn’t have a place to spend the day into our home to enjoy the warm company and join in the joy and laughter and eating. It’s about not having enough room at the table for everyone because there are so many people.

   As soon as Thanksgiving is over, fine, go ahead and trample each other in stores on Black Friday, blast Christmas music out of every window, put up a thousand trees and a million lights and throw candy canes everywhere, but please don’t leave Thanksgiving out entirely. It’s not a holiday that should be glossed over just because Christmas is considered to be a bigger, better celebration. Most importantly, please don’t let commercialization take away the meaning from either holiday.