Dec 15, 2008
Bossy’s Favorite Things.
Shopping for a Christmas Tree.
Bossy has a very small house, and so shopping for a Christmas tree means locating the skinniest 8′ tree available. Bossy is always into trees that have some space between the branches to allow for decoration — and if you want to know the truth, Bossy is into spindly old-fashioned trees that look like they are actually the tops of larger trees as seen in 1940s movies. Except these days you can’t find trees like that, because all of the trees are perfectly symmetrical Stepford Trees that have been produced on Christmas Tree Farms and sometimes fed preservatives so they no longer even smell like Christmas Trees.
Wait — is this the Favorite Things feature? Oops.
Never mind. One of Bossy’s favorite things is going with her family to adopt that year’s tree, because it usually requires much negotiation and hones the courtroom skills.
Bossys’s son and daughter always want a tree larger than the room can hold, and they have a practiced look of disgust when Bossy suggests the more spindly trees. Bossy’s husband likes to walk rows and rows ahead, suggesting trees that get instantly rejected, usually because they have The Wrong Kind Of Needles and don’t you remember those kind of needles stab you?
This year Bossy’s son was still at college when the family selected the tree, but Bossy’s daughter had his back and argued for a specimen with girth and height and no bare spots.
I call them Charlie Brown Christmas trees and I look for one just like it every year. The skinnier and spindlier, the better! I’ve got your back!
I love Charlie Brown trees. I’m a little sorry that we don’t have a live tree at home.
Christmas tree shopping is one of my favorite things. I like the branches with space between, too. That way it highlights all the quirky, nonmatching ornaments.
Your kids would love my tree. The bigger the better, I always say. Even in my 900 sq. ft. house.
Stepford Trees? Bahahaha, sounds like something they would find in Utah County! (45 min south of Dooceland, FYI)
Get this, we go to a local tree farm (in OK), ride the cart out to the trees, look around, and and then buy a tree imported from Oregon or somewhere because “it must be a Noble Fir by God!”
I’ve got a spindly little three-foot fake tree because I’d have no room in my house for me or my beast of a dog if we had a bigger tree.
Bossy likes the same kind of tree that I do – need space for ornaments!
I’m with you on the “space between the branches” kind of tree, but I’m always out voted. We end up with a Stepford tree that looks like it was shaped in a giant pencil sharpener. Bleh!
as god as my witness, I will never have anything but a noble fir…the spaciousness, the bushiness, the perfect mix of sparcity ++barity…oh, just look for yourself!http://coastalnest.blogspot.com/2008/11/hunt.html
perfect, imperfect tilty perfection..this year we got a leaner with a bad trunk! Its wonderful!
So did you get tall and spindly, short and round, or tall and husky? Please post a pic.
Oh how I miss shopping for Christmas trees. My husband refuses to get a live one. I absolutely adore the scent of a Fraser Fir. Now all I have is a Yankee Candle to bring back the memories.
I like that your Sunshine held her own while Bossy’s man-child is away! It’s good to teach the young girls not to be too sweet!
here in the Netherlands pretty much everyone has trees that look like they came off the tops of other trees.
I use the same menorah every year.
Our living room is quite small as well, and we have always gotten a “living tree” (around 7′ tall potted tree) and then planted it after.
Bossy needs to take a drive to Upstate NY to the tree place dlyn & co checked out the other day – they got that spindly-smallish tree thang goin on good.
OK you lot. Talk about tree snobbery. How about the hellish heat of an Aussie summer… where the only good Christmas fir is an artificial one. Of course, you CAN use a native shrub and have rubbish all over the floor within half an hour. I’m not so much into vaccuuming.
Long live the fake fir.
Oi!
BB
We planted at least 3000 pines of various kinds out back to grow and sell as Christmas trees. Of course we can’t bear to chop them down so every year we buy a potted tree and plant it once spring comes. This year’s tree is a 5 foot Normand fir. Handsome little guy.
If I didn’t already know it, it would be obvious from your tree preferences that you do not have preschoolers in your house. I, in fact, prefer the prickly trees — the pricklier the better — because they discourage little hands from removing ornaments at every opportunity and carrying them around the house. And so we always get the really long needle Douglas firs. Which I also love because I love full, fluffy, no gaps anywhere trees that look like fairyland when filled with little white lights. But the built-in punishment for filchers of ornaments is a lovely added bonus.