By Betsy Klein

(CNN) — White House tours will resume for the first time in months with the halls decked, welcoming visitors back to the People’s House just in time for the holidays.

The tours, which were halted in September as the East Wing was demolished to make way for President Donald Trump’s new ballroom, will start back up on December 2. With construction underway, a reimagined tour will steer clear of debris on the South Lawn and skip several key sites.

But first, the trees must be trimmed. Monday marks the kickoff to Christmastime at the White House as first lady Melania Trump will welcome the official Christmas tree, a concolor fir, which will be the centerpiece of the Blue Room.

The fir hails from Korson’s Tree Farms in Sidney, Michigan, and was selected by longtime White House grounds superintendent Dale Haney in conjunction with the National Christmas Tree Association in September. After a 650-mile journey, it will become part of an annual tradition Monday afternoon, arriving at the White House in a Clydesdale-drawn carriage for the first lady’s inspection.

The following day, President Trump will participate in another White House holiday tradition as he is expected to grant clemency to a pair of North Carolina turkeys, Gobble and Waddle. Justice will be served for fowl reasons as the president dishes out a pair of pardons, a yearly opportunity for a cornucopia of puns — and a moment to give thanks.

While the Trump family spends the Thanksgiving holiday in Palm Beach, Florida, there will be a flurry of activity back in Washington as volunteers race to transform the White House into a winter wonderland.

“The decorations in each room will be thoughtfully designed and curated under the direction of First Lady Melania Trump,” said a press release from the first lady’s office.

It continued: “Visitors will have the opportunity to enjoy the beloved annual tradition that transforms the White House into a festive reflection of the spirit, warmth, faith, and hope of the holiday season.”

Though her office has not formally unveiled a theme for the holiday season, Trump posted a short preview video from an October Christmas meeting that appeared to suggest decorations would be gold and gilded, in keeping with many of the president’s adjustments to the West Wing.

During the Trumps’ first term in 2017, the first lady went with a classic “Time-Honored Traditions” theme, featuring Franklin D. Roosevelt’s 1866 edition of “A Christmas Carol” and a tribute to first lady Jacqueline Kennedy’s “Nutcracker Suite” 1961 theme. The 2018 theme of patriotism — with an overarching red motif — came under fire for the memorable blood-red trees lining the East Colonnade that critics compared to “The Handmaid’s Tale.”

“We are in the 21st century and everybody has a different taste,” she later said of the decor.

Patriotism was again the theme in 2019, with stars, stripes and giant golden eagles. And 2020 decorations paid tribute to essential workers during the Covid-19 pandemic, including a tree with ornaments shaped like a trash truck, scientist, caregiver, lab coat and nurse hat.

Trump has also privately lamented the holiday requirements for a presidential spouse. She was secretly recorded in the summer of 2018 expressing frustration at being criticized for her husband’s family separation policy at the US-Mexico border while needing to perform traditional first lady duties.

“I’m working … my a** off on the Christmas stuff, that you know, who gives a f**k about the Christmas stuff and decorations? But I need to do it, right?” she said in tapes recorded by a former friend and adviser, Stephanie Winston Wolkoff.

She continued, “OK, and then I do it and I say that I’m working on Christmas and planning for the Christmas and they said, ‘Oh, what about the children that they were separated?’ Give me a f**king break.”

The White House is expected to welcome thousands of people through its doors this holiday season for an augmented tour after the main entry point for visitors, the East Wing, was demolished.

Starting December 2, visitors will have access to only one floor of the White House, including the Cross Hall, East Room, Green Room, Blue Room, Red Room and State Dining Room.

It will no longer include historic rooms on the ground floor, including the Library, Vermeil Room and China Room, as well as the Diplomatic Reception Room, which was opened to visitors for the first time during the Biden administration.

Some of those historic rooms are being used as office space for the first lady’s staff, who were displaced from their East Wing headquarters.

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