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#Post#: 10172--------------------------------------------------
O Chritmas Tree (2018)
By: Jack Date: November 24, 2018, 7:49 am
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For those of you who've been regular followers of the forum for
a while now, you might guess that we did receive and set up our
Christmas Tree yesterday.
For those of you who are new to us (or forgetful), we have a
live tree delivered every year. My living room has a vaulted
ceiling, and we set it up in the (open) hall, next to the stairs
to the teen area, which is basically the raised area around the
living room. It means having to walk into the living room to
get around it, but we live with it.
We used to wait until closer to Christmas to decorate, but when
Barry and Noah left for college for the first time, they kind of
insisted that we start doing it when they're home. The other
college kids supported them, and the tree last that long with
just a little care, so we do it the day after Thanksgiving.
We used to have a get together with friends on the evening after
Thanksgiving to play games and share leftovers, but putting the
Christmas tree up now has changed that dynamic, and we've been
trying different things. I think last year was the one I liked
best, and it's what we're going to do from now on.
This year, we put up and decorated the tree yesterday afternoon.
Then our family friends joined us last night. Many of them
will be coming back today to help us put up the outside
decorations, and we'll probably end up helping decorate some of
the other houses in the area - those belonging to older people
who have trouble getting up and down to do it all.
By the way, when I say 'family friends', I'm talking about the
Malones, Marchants, Dugans, Tidwells, Strouses, Ames, and others
- most of the same ones who'll be here for the Tribal Party.
Oh, this year we let Connor select the tree topper, but we let
Curtis put it up. We'll reverse that next year. Connor went
with the color changing start, which is probably one of my two
favorites.
Yesterday I was asked about any 'theme' our tree had, which I
didn't know was a thing. We go with a pretty traditional look,
though we have picked up a lot of novelty ornaments over the
years. We try to be restrained with those, and most of the tree
is decorated with small lights and red or green (or both) balls,
with some blue, silver, and gold thrown in for accent.
If you want a more detailed description of our house at
Christmas, you should check my web site at the Holidays with the
Wellses page -
HTML http://www.bransomtx.com/holidays.htm
#Post#: 10173--------------------------------------------------
Re: O Chritmas Tree (2018)
By: db105 Date: November 24, 2018, 8:39 am
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;D So soon! You guys are as fast about this as department
stores. (I know it's so college boys can be there for it). Very
nice!
#Post#: 10175--------------------------------------------------
Re: O Chritmas Tree (2018)
By: Zyngaru Date: November 24, 2018, 9:53 am
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Very nice Jack. I agree. For you, putting up the tree and
decorating is best done while you have all that older labor
available.
I out up my tree and inside decorations the 1st of December. My
tree is easy peasy. It's a 4 foot fiber optics tree. So no
extra lighting needed. I do put up a village with train and
that takes awhile to unpack and set up. In the past I put
lights around my windows on the inside, but this year I am
lighting up my porch. It is a covered porch that goes all the
way across the front of my house. I put out the lights earlier
when it was still warm outside, just haven't plugged them in
yet. Later I will add the Christmas lighted panels and hook
everything up which should light my porch nicely.
In the backyard, I have a 9 foot wood cross I made and I will
light it up. I have a nativity which lights up and I will put
one of those snowflake lights out that lights up the whole
backyard.
Christmas is my favorite season. My light bill jumps up
something terrible. It always runs way below the efficient line
on the graph and twice as low as what my neighbors use. But
during Christmas my electric bill gets up to what my neighbors
bill is all the time. But it is Christmas and it's my season to
enjoy.
#Post#: 10176--------------------------------------------------
Re: O Chritmas Tree (2018)
By: kalico Date: November 24, 2018, 1:10 pm
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Sounds like a fun night and day.....
I always put mine up thanksgiving weekend
But I do a fake tree 🌲
Love your description and have a great time
Hugs kal
#Post#: 10177--------------------------------------------------
Re: O Chritmas Tree (2018)
By: stevieweeks Date: November 24, 2018, 1:57 pm
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See Stevie's tree in Free Discussion...
[glow=red,2,300]Does Stevie need a new Christmas Tree?[/glow]
HTML https://jackshouse.createaforum.com/free-discussion/does-stevie-need-a-new-christmas-tree/
#Post#: 10178--------------------------------------------------
Re: O Chritmas Tree (2018)
By: David M. Katz Date: November 24, 2018, 2:33 pm
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How do your pets, especially the cats and ferrets, react to the
tree? I always had a hard time keeping the cat out of the tree.
#Post#: 10197--------------------------------------------------
Re: O Chritmas Tree (2018)
By: Jack Date: November 25, 2018, 7:02 am
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[quote author=David M. Katz link=topic=969.msg10178#msg10178
date=1543091608]
How do your pets, especially the cats and ferrets, react to the
tree? I always had a hard time keeping the cat out of the tree.
[/quote]
The cats do occasionally get into the trees or break an
ornament, but that's part of having pets (and kids). We just
use a very sturdy holder - I think the brand name might be
Goliath, but it weighs over 60 pounds, and each leg is about 15"
(it holds four gallons of water!). Since we put it near the
staircase, we also secure it about halfway up. While we do try
to get the animals to give it some space, they're animals, and
somethings things happen.
As I said earlier, next year, we're going to start doing things
the way we did last year, which worked best, I think. For that,
we set up and light the tree, but we don't decorate it until
Friday evening, which is family only time (even when we try to
make Friday afternoon family only, we still have visitors coming
by to see if anyone can play). Then, Saturday afternoon we
decorate, then that evening we play games and share Thanksgiving
leftovers. That just seems to work best.
Still, Friday and Saturday were some really nice weather, and
everything went really well.
One small point is that we don't decorate the tree now because
of the extra labor available; we do it because the kids want to
help decorate the tree without having to make a special trip
home with finals coming.
If you think about it, I have four older sons, who are all in
their thirties. Then there's a skip of nearly four years,
before 11 more boys who are spread out over 6 years. Then
there's a large cluster of boys who were all within a year or so
of each other, and those are the ones for whom this became a
point. Because I use (and recycle) a live tree, I thought it
would limit our time, but the place I buy mine is willing to cut
it the day before Thanksgiving and ship it to us (it'll be a few
more years before the ones we have at the Pumpkin Patch reach
this size) for delivery the day after Thanksgiving, and those
will keep through January, as long as we're careful to keep them
watered, so that's what we do now.
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