The Tree

Used to be, when I was a much younger women, we had no less than 6 decorated trees in our house. One year we had 8 trees and I put them all up in a tree-decorating frenzy that lasted 3 days. That was also the week I left one of the kids in the church nursery and didn't realize she wasn't in the car until I pulled into the driveway at home.

I was a little distracted with visions of Christmas trees dancing in my head.

I used to put a tree in each of the kids bedrooms, in the living room, in the sun room, in the kitchen...every where I could stick one, I did. And each one had it's own theme. Plus I used to try something new each year with our main family tree although it never seemed to work out...

I tried the all snowman tree but I couldn't keep it from melting and shorting out the lights...the all-one-color tree but the Grinch green tree I put up made everyone nauseous...the skinny tree but I resented it...the upside down tree but every time I went into the family room, I felt the need to walk scrunched over with my arms out for balance.

(Da-Dum-Dum...applause, applause...
"Thank you! Thank you! I'll be here all week!")

We've had live trees and artificial ones too. We've bought them at grocery stores and in parking lots. We've cut them down at Christmas tree farms and once inherited a 1960's model from Mark's parents. We've gotten a few half off on the day after Christmas sale and we've had one that cost more than my present to Mark that particular year. (I didn't hear the guy in the flannel hat with the toothpick in his mouth correctly...I thought he said $65, not $25...and he apparently thought the extra $40 I handed him was a tip).

This year I lost the battle between getting another live tree or buying a fancy pre-lit tree. We've had a live one the last few years but after hearing the kiddos gripe about having to put lights on the tree for the umpteenth time, I caved and sent Hayden off on the blackest of days to buy one on sale. A Martha Stewart tree no less. Fancy-schmancy.

I'm actually looking forward to having an artificial tree this year because we always seem to have problems when we have a live tree. There always seems to be some leaning involved. We usually have the tree pretty straight starting off, but as the weeks roll by, the leaning becomes more and more pronounce. Except last year, we started out leaning.

Here the menfolk are, trying to fix last year's leaning problem.

And the fact that after the first week we never water it again probably has something to do with the leaning as well. That's always been Hayden's job, to water the tree.

Thankfully that hasn't been his job when it comes to our pets.

So our ONE new Christmas tree has been purchased, assembled and is currently residing upright in our sun room. It's waiting to be decorated this evening with some special ornaments from years past and a few new ones, including this little gem I got in the mail just today.

It's an ornament from the restaurant my baby brother is obsessed with, he goes there everyday for coffee.

We'll put it next to our Dunkin' Donuts ornament.