Why We Gave Up On Real Christmas Trees
I love Christmas trees. Marty and I don’t exchange Christmas presents, but we do give each other an ornament every year. We both have a lot of fun getting creative with it. Last year, we took our first trip to Bethany Beach, and as soon as we got there we realized this was a beach we would probably visit a lot. We loved it there. We were browsing around some of the shops, and one shop in particular had some really cute ornaments. I managed to snag an ornament when Marty wasn’t looking, run up to the register, and buy it without him seeing. I told the lady at the register what I was up to so she didn’t think I was crazy when I shoved it in my purse right away. Marty never knew. He even came up and started chatting as I finished paying because he thought I was buying something else. The cashier and I shared a good smile about that one.
I’ve always been a real Christmas tree girl, but last year Marty and I just never got around to going out in the cold, strapping the thing to the top of the car, praying it made it home, putting it up and having the same frustration of one of us laying on the floor, the other dealing with the prickly needles and sap. It’s leaning to the right! A little to the left! It’s straight! No, it’s not! And then there is the stringing the lights, watering it, then forgetting to water it and hoping it doesn’t spontaneously combust, vacuuming needles, vacuuming needles, and vacuuming needles. Then continuing to vacuum stray needles for the rest of the year that somehow make it all over the house. Plus, I’m allergic. I put up with all of this, and the tree repays me by making me sneeze for a month straight.
Thus, we didn’t put up a tree last year. At all. Sad.
This year I was determined to do a tree. But then my logical side kicked in. Is this whole real tree thing really worth it? Yes, it is pretty, and yes it smells nice (when I’m not sneezing), but gosh darn it’s kind of a headache, and we’re also out $30 or so a year for it.
I got to looking at artificial trees, and some are pretty nice! And they make them so easy to put together now! I don’t have to venture out in the cold and deal with all of the real tree issues!
So we broke down and bought this Martha Stewart Pre-lit Downswept Denison tree. It was originally $200, but then it went down to $69 (!!!) on Black Friday. I’m generally not a Black Friday shopper, but I keep tabs on the prices of things I have recently bought because most stores have a price guarantee policy where you can get credited if the price goes down shortly after you buy it. I have never actually had luck with this strategy before, and the past couple of years I found that my recently purchased electronics (a computer and a TV) were actually more on Black Friday. Go figure. So, it was a huge surprise when the price of the tree went down so much. I had already bought the tree before Black Friday, so I called up Home Depot and they offered to send me a gift card for the difference in price. Um, yes please! The amount of DIY projects we do on our little fixer upper makes a gift card to a hardware store practically like cash anyway.
One of the big selling points of this tree for me was you can switch between colored and white lights. I’m a colored lights girl, but Marty kind of likes the white lights. And I particularly like colored lights that have purple which are really hard to find on fake trees, and this one had purple lights. I like the whole rainbow on my tree, people. The colored lights bring back a little of that childhood Christmas magic for me. The purple ones especially.
But then after setting up the tree and turning on the colored lights, I didn’t like them. Not these. They have come a long way making LED lights look like the old faithful incandescents, but the colors just aren’t quite there. They are still kind of neonish. We flipped on the white lights and I love them! They do look just like warm white incandescent lights. But I missed the colors. So I got a box of colorful jewel toned ornaments from Target to make up for the lack of colored lights, and you know what? I like it even more. It’s prettier during the day with the extra ornaments and colors, and it’s easier to see all of our favorite ornaments at night with the white lights.
And another big bonus was setup. The tree came in three pieces plus the base. I was able to do it by myself since the tree came when Marty wasn’t home and I was too excited to wait. The three pieces just slid in together, no screwing or tightening of anything, and the branches were attached and simply unfolded. The little parts of the branches came all mushed and you are supposed to “fluff” them and spread them all out. Fluffing the branches took approximately…forever. But it was mostly me being a fluffing neurotic ;).
So all in all, this was a big Christmas decorating purchasing year for us, but the $85 or so that we spent on a new tree and a box of colorful ornaments is worth it to us.
Plus, it looks quite nice with our newly painted fireplace.
BTW, thanks so much for your kind comments and emails about my post the other day, the one I was scared to write.
Let's keep the fun going! You can find me here sharing all of my favorite paint color trends, decor ideas, and updates on daily life:Follow me on Facebook
Follow me on Twitter
Follow me on Pinterest
Follow me on Instagram
Follow me on Google
And make sure to follow my paint color blog, Involving Color, where I feature real rooms and their paint colors. I have hundreds of colors to browse and add new ones daily!
