O Tannenbaum

Living in Northern Florida we do not have the opportunity to cut down our own Christmas Tree (I know there is a Christmas Tree farm in Havana, but their not the type that I like.) I guess the red clay beneath us is not friendly to the spruces. So instead of heading to the non-existent mountains, the over-priced boy scout lot, or the similarly over-priced roadside stand, we headed off to Lowes. Nothing says Christmas like you neighborhood hardware store.

Apparently we picked a popular day to go because it seemed reminiscent of my Black Friday experiences. While there was no running or ripping open glass display cases, people were not in the best mood. It can get a little testy picking out the perfect Christmas Tree. The biggest challenge seems to be standing with a tree long enough to let the stupid branches fall to see if it is full enough. When someone did find a nice tree they would suddenly have 5 people ask them if they were going to buy it.

"No, I don't think I will buy this perfectly shaped tree that I stood with for 20 minutes while the branches dropped. Why don't you take it so you can cut out the tedious work. I'll head back over to the huge pile of trees to try and find another one."

I mean are people really that stupid?

It was tough work finding a perfect suitable Christmas Tree. As you will see from the pictures I was ready to go.

After we got the perfect suitable tree home, I realized that we had thrown out our old non-LED lights. Apparently I was going to buy some after I threw them out last year, but I guess I skipped that step. After some more digging in the very well organized holiday closet I did end up finding one strand of new LED colored lights. It was not enough for the tree, so I decided to go to Home Depot. On my way out Rian said that she wanted clear lights, I said, "I don't think that that will look right with colored lights up top and clear lights on the bottom, actually it will probably look stupid." No she said it would look good and she wanted the clear lights. I confirmed once more and got the same answer, so off to the store I went. After heading to Home Depot and Lowes I found some C5 Clear LED lights and put them on the tree when Rian was working.

She comes out and was like 'what is that, it looks awful.' "Why did you get clear lights?"


This is where my palm met my face. "Really, I don't think I could confirm the fact that you wanted clear lights any more."

These were her exact words, "Oh, I wanted clear lights sprinkled throughout the tree and colored lights at the bottom." Maybe you all can clear up my misunderstanding from what I described above.

So there I was trying to figure out the Christmas light origami to get the stupid clear lights back on the plastic clips and into the box.

Back to Lowes. "Sir, is there anything wrong with these lights?" "No, I just apparently don't understand the English language as my wife sees it and I though clear meant clear lights, not colored lights." All I got from the girl was a puzzled look. Oh well, the great light caper was finally over.

Here are some long awaited pics from the tree pickin':

Let me tell you how easy it is to traipse through piles of trees with a Brother strapped to your back.

Peach in her 'elf' baby legs.

I think we finally ended up with this one.

Chris