NEWPORT BEACH : Yule Spirit in Blossom at Nursery

It may be only October, but the folks at Roger’s Gardens don’t think it’s too early to start celebrating Christmas.

Forget the sun shining outside. Inside the Christmas Fantasy display at the Corona del Mar nursery, candles have been lit, trees have been trimmed and carols are playing on the loudspeakers. The nursery on San Joaquin Hills Road has been getting a jump on the season for 20 years.

“It’s never too early to shop for Christmas,” said Sheri Coates of Mission Viejo, who was making her annual pilgrimage to the Roger’s Gardens with friend Joan Smith of Laguna Hills. “We always come here in October.”

Like the hordes that have visited the nursery in recent days, the two self-described “shopaholics” said they look forward to getting a head start on the holiday season.

On Thursday, Smith picked out a simple crystal cross that will go on this year’s tree, which will be decked out entirely in crystal and gold ornaments.

But anyone seeking simplicity should probably head elsewhere.

There is not a strand of ordinary tinsel or of popcorn thrown around any of the 40 trees on display. Each has a theme that took a small band of designers months to buy ornaments for and five weeks to decorate.

The idea, said Catherine Blackburn, who oversees the displays, is to give shoppers some ideas for tree trimming.

At the top of an Egyptian-themed tree, an oversized peacock sits where an angel might be. Faces of pharaohs and the Sphinx dangle in place of plain round balls.

Another tree, called Christmas Eve Symphony, is decorated with dozens of nearly life-size French horns and trumpets, and hundreds of tiny violins and harps.

One admirer of the trees, Mary Subbloie, backed into a corner before giving up her efforts to take pictures. “They are too big and won’t fit in the frame,” she said.

The 64-year old tourist from Orange, Conn., said she hoped to capture a bit of California extravagance on film to show her kids back East.