Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Its not a religious holiday for me but i still love it.
When i was single I had a live potted shrub I would keep trimmed into a sort of Christmas tree shape and decorate that for almost every holiday. Just small ornaments and some themed garland, no lights.
I kept xmass tree lights along the border of the living room all year long. Red white and blue flashers for the summer, solid white on a dimmer for every other time of year (...mood lighting), then multicolor flashers for xmas.
Once my son was born I had a real tree up the weekend after Thanksgiving until new years. I tried to start a tradition of cutting our own tree down but my then wife hated hiking through the farms in the cold/snow. The couple years after the divorce I let me son pick a tree from one of the side of the road guys. My current GF poopoo-ed the idea from the moment i mentioned that I would like to start cutting our own tree again. I tried to get the boys into it but the last 2 years there was SOOO much complaining and crying and arguing that we are just getting a cheap fake one this year.
Hopefully they will hate it so much we can go back to getting a real one again.
Fake... I am no tree hugger but after Xmas, it is very disheartening to see all the "live" trees laying on the curbs to be picked up by garbage trucks or seeing piled up at the local recycling center... There is nothing wrong with fake trees as they do in fact, look real.
Fake... I am no tree hugger but after Xmas, it is very disheartening to see all the "live" trees laying on the curbs to be picked up by garbage trucks or seeing piled up at the local recycling center... There is nothing wrong with fake trees as they do in fact, look real.
Key word there-recycle. Christmas tree farms are most often located on former row-crop land that otherwise would have been sold to developers. If it wasn't for Christmas tree farms, a lot more of New Jersey would be developed. Christmas trees are a fast growing, renewable resource-dead trees are ground into mulch which is then used to grow all kinds of things. Ground up pine trees make fantastic rich mulch. Old trees are also sunk into lakes to create underwater structures that fish use for cover and breeding.
At least for me, a fake tree will never smell like a real tree (or look like one for that matter), and pulling out a box of plastic parts and green pipe cleaners and putting it together like an erector set isn't really my idea of a holiday tradition. Loading up in the car, trekking out in the cold, finding the perfect tree, cutting it down with a saw that my grandfather used to cut the family tree down when my dad was a kid, and dragging it back, followed by some hot cocoa/coffee, then trimming it in the living room is.
ivan, which "kind" of tree did you get from basalm hill, i've done real most of my life and am ready to be done with that, i almost bought on from basalm last year but my wife convinced me to do a real tree again. they seem to look like the real deal on their website
ivan, which "kind" of tree did you get from basalm hill, i've done real most of my life and am ready to be done with that, i almost bought on from basalm last year but my wife convinced me to do a real tree again. they seem to look like the real deal on their website
I went with the unlit Blue Spruce 7.5' (traditional). $229. Ordered on Friday and got it on Saturday. They have better 'real' looking ones but they're more $ ("more realistic" and "realistic"). The traditional version was good enough for me.
Didn't bother with the lit ones since I don't want to deal with burnt out lights, fixing connections etc.. I'd rather do the lights myself. I'm lazy but not that lazy.
How's daycare going? My kid's on week 3 of daycare (6 month's old) with his first fever/cold....
Last edited by Ivan Putski; 11-19-2014 at 01:31 PM..
I went with the unlit Blue Spruce 7.5' (traditional). $229. Ordered on Friday and got it on Saturday. They have better 'real' looking ones but they're more $ ("more realistic" and "realistic"). The traditional version was good enough for me.
Didn't bother with the lit ones since I don't want to deal with burnt out lights, fixing connections etc.. I'd rather do the lights myself. I'm lazy but not that lazy.
How's daycare going? My kid's on week 3 of daycare (6 month's old) with his first fever/cold....
That sounds about right. My kids were sick as dogs their first month or two in daycare, and also infected my husband and me. It was awful. However, I can say anecdotally that daycare, IMHO, really built up their immune systems. They are in 11th grade now and I can say honestly in their 12 year school career they've been out collectively MAYBE 8 days. They are luckily truly very healthy kids, which I'm thankful for. Hang in there!
We usually go with a real tree during the first weekend in December but we decided to go with an artificial tree this year and for the foreseeable future. We're putting it up on Nov 30 (Sunday). Just curious when NJ CD folks put theirs up.
I see no point in killing a perfectly good tree. Fake looks fake. So my answer would have to be option three, an invisible one.
My parents always had a fake tree so once i moved out I swore I'd never have anything but a real one. We used to go to the tree farm and cut it down ourselves, but now we just go to the farm down the road and select a precut one.
We usually opt for a douglas fir and put it up the first or second weekend in December. Always used to wait til January 6th to dismantle it, but I get tired of the needles dropping, so most decorations are off it by New Year's Eve, though we leave the lights on it. It's usually out of the house on the 2nd of January these days. We then take it to be recycled into wood chips.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
