*** My Last Real Christmas Tree ***

Fake tree, real wreaths. You get the scent.

Funny story Rick. I had close to the same thing happen onetime. We finally got the tree up after a comedy of errors and within 5 minutes the cat climbed the curtains, jumped on the top of the tree and it all came down.
We left it like that. It became quite the conversation piece.

Oh man, had me rolling Rick, great story. I;ve had probably a similar happen to me throughtout my years. I found the part about having to re=cut the tree several times particularly funny because I had almost similar thing but I had to get redressed, haul the tree back outside, get the #%$%$ chainsaw started again, back inside, didn't fit, back out...Yea, I sympathized and laughed right along. Come to think of it, that was the tree I had to literally tie string and attch it to the walls with tacking some nails in the wall. In the middle of the night one of the nails pulled and the sound of the tree hitting the floor woke us up. We were startled, not scared, nothing, we knew exactly what it was and right back to sleep.

J

I had similar experience as mist. The two children & I went out with a large group of friends to cut our trees, hubby was not able to go. we picked out the beautiful tree and I sawed it down & the group headed back to the party. This was a yearly tradition. When we got home later I found that the tree was too large to fit our space so it went outside on our large front porch fully decorated. Hubby then had to go out the next day & buy another tree. That was the only time I went on my own to the tree cutting. Costly mistake.

Diane

Rick...I hate to say this....but have you ever thought of moving to California? Oh! That's right, you've mentioned it before. I keep forgetting my Jersey roots....and how it USED to be!

Nope, Haven't forgot that.

I remember it everytime I scratch a lottery ticket


Rick

I enjoyed the story Rick. I posted a Christmas tree story on the paid side a long time ago and since enough time has passed repetition may be acceptable.

My Mother was hosting her annual sorority Christmas party and wanted the “perfect” tree to highlight the decorations in her living room. I took her tree shopping on a cold evening to a local tree lot. She spotted a tree as we entered the tree lot that had a perfect shape and was covered with and light blue flocking. We looked at every tree on the lot but my Mom kept going back to the flocked tree. Before I knew it there were two guys putting a big plastic bag over the flocked tree and asking which vehicle was mine.

I got the tree into the house after attaching the stand on the porch. The tree salesman had cut several inches from the bottom of the trunk and drilled a hole up the middle and stuffed it with cotton which was supposed to keep the tree fresh when combined with a solution of water, bleach and aspirin placed in the bottom of the stand.

My job was to attach the lights and leave the ornament hanging to my Mom. I had to wait until the next day after Mom had purchased strands of C7 “satin” blue and green lights. Once decorated, the tree looked spectacular with silver, green and blue ornaments and the new lights. It was nestled in a corner next to the stairway that had a white banister decorated with fresh pine roping and blue and green velvet ribbons and bows. The holiday theme decorations would have been perfect for a cover of Better Homes & Garden magazine. Mom was a hit with her sorority sisters.

Now the story takes a turn. It was after Christmas and I got a frantic message at work from my Father to get to their house as soon as possible. My Father was a large man who enjoyed Christmas especially since it was also his birthday. He had a tailored Santa suit made so he could volunteer to portray jolly St. Nick for local charities and organizations. My father was a good person but short on patience. He decided to remove the decorations from the flocked tree and get it out of the house.

When the long pine needles repeatedly punctured his hands his serenity from the holiday disappeared and he grabbed an end of a strand of lights and began to pull vigorously until the lights gave up their hold on the branches.

When I finally managed to get to my parent’s home I found my Father, the stairway, the living room and our wiener dog, Max, all covered with light blue flocking. My father was pounding the vacuum cleaner which had jammed with flocking and seized up the motor. I gently cleaned flocking from Max while my father issued torrents of negative comments like; this flocking tree, flock this mess, no one is ever getting a flocking tree as long as I have a flocking thing to say about the flocked up mess.

You would have to have known my Mother to appreciate that after this outburst by Dad she played the martyr the next Christmas and bought the sadist looking tree anyone has ever seen and adorned it with a couple of ornaments and some old tinsel. No one made any comment about the trees past or present.