Shocked and slightly embarrassed

Indeed, I am shocked and slightly embarrassed to report that we now own ... are you ready? ... an artificial Christsmas tree. Gasp, sigh. It's something we have considered over the years, usually around the time we need to clean up all the needles from our dried out tree. For our first several Christmases, we were given a tree by our realtor friend in Langley. Although we never sold or purchased a home with him, he included us in his tree annual give-away. That sure was nice. Two years ago, our first Christmas in Prince Rupert, Paul went out into the bush to find a tree. We were pleased with his choice, although it was a bit on the scrawny side. Didn't it look charming? Nevermind the mismatched white lights. One string was significantly brighter.


What we didn't know about our little Charlie Brown tree was that it was a Hemlock. The like to live in the forest. They really, really like to live in the forest. Once taken indoors, they put up considerable protest. A naked protest. Never before have we seen needles fall so quickly from a tree. One touch of a branch and they would shatter to the carpet. I wish I had taken a picture of the clean circle of carpet that was left after we moved the tree and its stand. Last year was the first time we actually spent money on a tree, $35 worth. It was a nice tree. Again, the endless needles on the carpet, and trying to keep those needles out of the mouths of my babes ... led us to consider getting a fakie.

A few weeks ago, on a Monday, I noticed the weekend sale flyer from Linens 'N Things. (Not Thongs, like I just accidentally typed.) The front page advertised a 7.5', 1300+ tips, 900 pre-lit tree. Regular price was $259, now advertised for $129. What a great deal! Too bad for us the sale ended on Sunday. Paul went to check it out anyway. He was pleased to learn that not only was the sale extended, there were 2 trees left. They even allowed him to use a 20% discount coupon, on top of the greatly reduced sale price. So he brought it home. Yay. He put it together and I spent the evening spreading out all the branches. Kind of a big job. Hopefully not so time consuming next year.

The boys were very excited the next morning when they woke to see the tree glowing in the the living room. With the lights on, I can almost forget that it's not a real tree. I saw my friend's beautiful real tree last night and had second thoughts about how much I like our fake one, but we'll give it a few years. I was waiting to put the decorations on until, I don't know what. One evening while I was at work Max convinced Paul to start decorating the tree. First they put on my 2 dozen red and gold balls. They look like a lot less on such a tall tree. When I got home after 9:00 that night Max was still awake, excited to show me what they had done. The next day the boys "helped me" put the straw decorations on. Due to Marty's keen interest in them, the bottom 1/3 of the tree is nearly bare, as we've moved the decorations up out of his reach after he has pulled them off. It's a mish mash of different things, but it works and I like it.

(Lunar Jim just finished and Max reminded me "time to turn off the TV! Hurry, hurry!". Thanks bud.)

Here's the boys working on the tree ...


The tree also came with a pre-lit wreath, however I haven't quite figured out how or where to hang it, considering that it needs to be plugged in. Right now Max used it to pretend to be a lion. He puts it around his face and yells "Yarrrrr!".