‘Tis the season… for stockings, present wrapping, and a REAL Christmas Tree! Not to rag on our 3 foot plastic tree from last Christmas…
I love that tree. I’ve had is since Freshman year in college. It’s low maintenance and was a simple setup for our first family Christmas last year. But there is something homey about having a REAL tree…
I grew up in Vermont. Every year we’d trek out to the Llama farm… walk the rows of trees searching for the perfect one, chop it down, bring it home, and decorate it. My dad used to setup the video camera (you know, the big boxes that hold a VHS that you have to hold up on your shoulder) on a tripod and set to record for a few seconds every couple minutes. It would record us setting up the tree every year. My sister, Sarah and I would take turns putting the star on every year (a big deal!).
On our road trip, I mentioned to Sarah that I kinda wanted a REAL tree. But they are pricey where we live and it would be more maintenance with watering it and vacuuming up the needles..and then Avery…oh gosh what would it be like with him and ornaments!?… So I asked Grammy. They do make shatter proof ornaments, and we can put them out of reach…
So with that, I put my order in. And when my parents brought Avery home after our road trip, they also brought a tree! Avery picked it out himself… but apparently wasn’t very interested…
We got some new ‘shatter proof’ ornaments and garland to add to our already growling ornament collection from last year…
Dad and Vinay rigged up the tree stand…
And we needed somewhere in our tiny house for the ‘big’ tree (it’s taller than me, so that’s big from my perspective!) So, I cleared the nook in the dining room where one of Avery’s play areas was…
Some toys he’s outgrown went in the basement and the others were moved to his bedroom. And wa-la! we had room for a tree!
Let the tree trimming begin…
Is it straight? No this way.. a little that way… perfect!
I chose all silver decorations, so if our tree was in a magazine, it would look something like this…
But then you gotta add all my childhood ornaments (there’s even one from my second birthday!), and all our new ornaments from last year…and you get a less picture perfect, but absolutely more homey tree that’s bursting with decorations like this!
Did you notice Avery was missing from all the ‘tree trimming’ ? We strategically put up the tree while Avery was napping A dear old friend (thanks, Mandie!) suggested we do that so when he sees the tree, he knows not to touch it, and doesn’t see us touching it. And that worked out….kinda. Since our ‘tree trimming’, Avery has picked off all the ornaments from the bottom foot of the tree and handed them to me. I’ve put them up higher on the tree so he can’t reach them. But overall he’s good about leaving it alone.
Now we’re in full holiday swing… I’ve got the (minimal) holiday decor out…stockings are hung, I used our old not-shatter proof ornaments as a centerpiece, and we’ve started putting up the holiday cards we’ve received….
Are you halls decked? Do you have a REAL or ‘fake’ tree?
