We have not had very good luck with Christmas Tree’s this year.

For a long time, my husband and I stuck to a small 3 foot Christmas Tree because we had one very mischievous cat named Scout who loved to nibble on the corners of wrapped Christmas presents and to bat the ornaments off the Christmas tree and run away with them. Even after he passed we didn’t think much of it and kept to our little Christmas tree. After out little one was born we decided to go ahead and use a bigger Christmas tree that was passed on to us from my sister. Last year it worked fine. This year, not so much.

We had barely had the tree set up when the little one pulled it over and broke the base. My husband thought he had it fixed so we got to decorating. Half way through decorating, it started to fall again. The base was toast. We ended the decorating for the evening so my husband could construct a new base for the tree.

A few weeks later we return inside the house from some outside play and the tree is on the floor. I would love to have been able to blame the child or the dog or one of the critters, but they were all outside with us. I don’t know what happened, but there it was, the tree on the floor, a handful of my favorite ornaments in pieces beneath it. Honestly, I just wanted to cry, but instead I took a breath and tore off all the ornaments and lights. I packed the tree up (where it belonged in a big black garbage sack) and took out my trusty little tree. We decorated again. Unfortunately the tree looks a little sad in comparison to the 6 foot tall one, but we hadn’t budgeted for a Christmas tree

.

A phone call this morning brings happy news. My husband said he acquired me a new Christmas tree. “I’ll have to take the tree money out of your Christmas present money,” he said. “It will break the budget otherwise. . . because you know we really couldn’t afford a whole $11.00.”