Merry Christmas!

I took down our Christmas tree on New Years Day.  But not before taking a picture of it.

Why is it here?

Well, I’m so happy I can add pictures to my blog now, that I couldn’t resist!

It’s not your traditional Christmas tree.  It’s an artificial one.  It’s white.  And it had an eclectic assortment of ornaments.  Some are store-bought, usually at reduced prices after Christmas.

Some of the ornaments have been lovingly made by hand.  Several are almost 15 years old.  And every year, I carefully re-wrap them.  The ones I’m talking about are cinnamon cookie-like ornaments, handmade by my sister and nephew when he was a toddler.  While they’ve lost their cinnamon fragrance,  not their brown color or appeal.  And every year we enjoy once again treasuring them.

We have a white Christmas tree.  No, it’s not traditional.  And I don’t care.  It occasionally loses a few needles, but not like the ones I remember as a child.  You know, the “real” trees.  And not having to remember and then climb under it to water it is a double blessing.  As are the lack of spiders.  We used to have to check the tree before bringing it in the house.  Even so, occasionally we’d miss, and some spider would come out in  the warm house.  Usually scaring one of us girls.

An added bonus of a nontraditional white tree is it’s easier for my mother to see the lights and ornaments than on a dark green background.  Something I frankly wish more graphic artists would pay attention to.  Sure the colors look nice, but actually reading a lot of small light type on a dark background is hard.  Sometimes impossible.

I hope you had a Merry Christmas, and 2009 is Happy and Healthy!