Decorating 'til their hearts are content
By GAYLE WEBER
The reindeer didn't make it out of Frank and Francie Rohleder's attic this year. Neither did the candy canes.
Instead of reindeer leading Santa's sleigh in the Rohleders front yard, Frank hitched up a flock of geese this year, at the urging of a friend.
"We take away and we add and we take away and we add," Francie Rohleder said of the process behind putting up her home's Christmas decorations.
The Rohleders have lit up the corner of 21st and Allen streets in Hays with homemade decorations and trees full of lights for more years than they can count. Every year, there's something just a little different in their holiday display -- and passers-by have shown their appreciation.
"We've gotten thank you notes for sharing our holiday with them," Francie Rohleder said.
But Christmas isn't the only time of year the Rohleders like to show their spirit. They have a homemade heart for Valentine's Day, a row of clovers for St. Patrick's Day and a fall display that transforms from Halloween with a spider house to Thanksgiving with a turkey in just a few hours.
Still, Christmas remains a favorite holiday for the couple, married for 61 years.
"We always have Christmas Eve and Christmas Day here," Francie Rohleder said.
They have eight children, 13 grandchildren and four great-grandchildren who always try to make it back for the family's favorite holiday.
"Even the grandchildren come home because they know Grandma's house is the Christmas house," she said.
That's for sure. Not only are there decorations outside, but Francie Rohleder was gearing up last week to start transforming the inside of her home.
"I've already started putting things away to make room for Christmas," she said.
The holiday starts early for the Rohleders.
"Frank is always the first one to buy a poinsettia plant," Francie Rohleder said.
And their decorations went up the day after Thanksgiving, when the weather was nice, including one of the first displays Frank ever made.
"The organ and choir boys I kind of just thought up," he said.
In the shuffle of moving decorations around, the original choir boys were lost, but Frank Rohleder was able to find patterns to make replicas.
However, he hasn't been so lucky to find matching patterns to his still incomplete nativity set.
"We thought we'd add to it, but we have never found anything that goes with it," Francie Rohleder said.
The Rohleders don't have as much of their Christmas decorations on display as they used to.
"We're getting older," Francie Rohleder said with a laugh.
But in recent years, the couple has gotten help from family members, who have their own Christmas displays to set up, too.
"We inherited that from them," said daughter, Gloria Rader. "We all do the same thing now, too."
The Rohleders said they will leave their holiday display up until New Year's Day, and then do it all again next year.