Oh, Christmas Tree

I thought I'd share a couple photos of our Christmas tree. It always looks so pretty the first day we put it up. We have a pre-lit tree that we bought a couple of years ago. My mom has a pre-lit tree that she actually puts more lights on, because she doesn't think there's enough lights on it. I don't know if this is normal or not, but I think putting lights on a pre-lit tree defeats the purpose, so if ours looks a little bare in the light department, that's why.

I alternate gold and red garland and then put poinsettas all over the tree. All of our decorations came from the Everythings a Dollar Store including the round ball ornaments that are plastic, not glass...you didn't really think I'd use glass ornaments with six kids, did you? The ornaments are purple and pearl white (in the picture the purple onaments look blue). Then I curl two gold ribbons and two red ribbons and drape them down the tree. Oh, and my dad bought me the pretty angel that we use at the top of the tree.

I always proclaim that there will be "NO crafty, homemade ornaments on the tree this year", which I realize sounds mean...but I just want it to be simply pretty. I like it that way. And it has always been my intention to buy a small tree to put in the playroom that the kids could decorate with all their homemade ornaments. But we never have the extra cash at Christmas to purchase one, and I always give in by about the second week of December and let the kids put there gazillion ornaments that they have already made that year on the tree. It doesn't seem to matter as the tree is already drooping and disorganized by the constant poking and reorganizing of the ornaments that the little ones do.

The exception to the "no glass" rule are these pretty ornaments that a friend made for me with our names and each of the kids names. She used clear and frosted ornaments, sprinkled glitter inside them, hotglued a ribbon and holly leaves on the top, and then wrote our names with a paint pen. She did this for her entire family for Christmas gifts that year. I thought it was such a pretty and inexpensive gift idea. I actually bought the ornaments and paint pens to write 25 different attributes of God, thinking that each night in December leading up to Christmas we could pull out a new ornament and discuss that attribute. That was three years ago and I've yet to do it....oh well, maybe next year. Pin It Now!