The 2010 PS Holiday Tree Thread

[davi_el_mejor]

Davi, great trees & you have the coziest looking living room! Steal, your kitty is hilarious -- I can relate. I have collected ornaments forever, buying some each place I traveled for work around the world & getting others on sale after Christmas. LOVE doing the tree & never do the same one twice. But....then we found a 5-wk-old kitten in our driveway & he became part of the family...to my dismay, that Christmas...and the one after....and the next. He got in league w/the puppy the 1st year, climbing the tree & throwing all my pretty feathered birds to the puppy, who chewed 'em up. In the morning I found a litter of little plastic corpses. Then Joe Don the Terminator got to work on lights, garlands & other ornaments. Here is his decor, our Christmas card the following year. My husband happened to catch him admiring his handiwork.

That is one amazing card! I hope he behaves himself this year! And thank you for compliments. The better half takes pride in how well we represent our abode

The new and improved coffee table statement (the last one made it impossible to put a coffee cup on it. what's the point of a coffee table if you can't even put your coffee on it??? )

Our stockings hung on the bookshelf with care

and a panorama of part of the living room.

 

[radiantquest]

Here it is. I don't know if my post got eaten or not, but I am the festive multicolor lights kind of person. While I was decorating today DH just stood by and watched. I asked what he thought and he said it looks exactly like what we were going for. When asked what "look" we were going for he replied "Too many ornaments." To which I said "Exactly!"

The first one is the closeup of the tree . The second is of doorway to the living room. You cant see it, but there is a santa on the top.

For those of you with kitties...Here is my advice. Fill the underneath with presents so that there isn't any place for them to climb from. Also, I went and bought bell ornaments. I call them tattelers. This way if someone is messing with the tree the little bells will ring and tattle on the kitties. Another thing that seems to be working so far is to keep the vacuum out and when they start to mess with it turn the vac on and they run far away as quick as they can.

 

[PumpkinPie]

While I was decorating today DH just stood by and watched. I asked what he thought and he said it looks exactly like what we were going for. When asked what "look" we were going for he replied "Too many ornaments." To which I said "Exactly!"

This is exactly our family's perspective. I took my DH home with me for the first time at Christmas 2 years ago and he was stunned (not in a good way) by our tree - but then again he grew up without a tree!
There are multicoloured lights, the ugliest of random handmade ornaments from kindergarten and tons of thick strands of tinsel and those old sparkly tinsel "icicles" (does anyone remember those?) literally thrown at the tree. It's the most beautiful ugly tree I've ever seen and I love it

 

[LaurenThePartier]

Davi, your trees make me so happy! Love your pics.

Where's Bebe? Her tree is always amazing!

Here's a pic from last year . . . pretty much looks the same this year . . . cat beds included.

 

[lulu66]

love all the trees so far. we picked ours out tonight, strapped it to the top of the car, & put it in the stand. but no lights or ornaments yet (tomorrow).

we're not a theme family either; just fill the thing up with lights & ornaments!!

 

[TravelingGal]

jewelfreak, that card cracked me up.

LOVE everyone's trees. This thread makes me so happy! You all do fantastic work, and take great photos to boot.

Here's mine. Some new shatterproof gold ornaments this year, plus some gold scarfing ribbon is what's new.

 

[Laila619]

Everyone's trees are just gorgeous!! Seriously, they could all be in a spread in Better Homes and Gardens!

 

[LadyBlue]

Our X-mas tree is up since yesterday

The train is the hogwarts express, I'm a Harry Potter dork

 

[Catmom]

I love all the trees so far, they are all gorgeous each in their own way! Here are my three trees. The main tree is in our family room and is a real tree. We are also another family that thinks you shouldn't be able to see the tree through the decorations. I have a second tree in my living room that is snowman/winter themed. My last tree is in my kitchen and contains all our special ornaments. Every year since we've been married and had a real tree we've taken a branch from that tree and put it in an ornament. It gets dated, decorated and we write on the ornament things that have happened in our lives during that year. It's always so fun to reminisce each time we put up the tree.

 

[radiantquest]

Well, the tattlers dont work and the newest one LOVES being in the tree!

Here is the proof

 

[radiantquest]

Oh, and heres one more because I cant pass up posting a picture with her mouth open.

 

[somethingshiny]

Only 1 tree this year! (and the advent tree that's only about 2 ft)

Hopefully I didn't totally screw up sizing, but we'll see!

The tree is prelit with white lights and I added some red and green lights to it. Not many, but enough for the kids to enjoy and add some pretty sparkle to my ornaments.

 

[Laila619]

Radiantquest, oh my gosh! How cute is she!

 

[Haven]

best.thread.ever.

 

[MAC-W]

I'm pretty sure my tree is going to be naked. There is no way my cat is going to cheerfully enjoy the lights/ornaments from a safe distance. I KNOW he's going to climb up into the tree and display his wild nature.

So, yeah, just a plain tree! Or maybe just put bells on the branches. Since I know he's going to play with the ornaments, make them fun ones for him. hahaha

This is my female cat when she was 8 months old. We lived in an apartment so she was a fully indoor cat at that time. She used to dance about the tree all the time, never knocked a single ornament off.

Now we're semi-rural, and she can play outside so she doesnt care about christmas trees at all any more, which is a good thing as she has gotten so big she would pull the tree over if she tried to climb it now.

Strangely enough her 2 brothers have never bothered with the tree and totally ignore it.

 

[monarch64]

Haven, you are so funny! FI is Jewish but he insisted I put up a tree in the house we rent. He also loves to go shopping for holiday gifts on Black Friday and to his dismay, overslept by 2 hours on Friday morning and BOUNDED out of bed when I woke him at 6:30. Your winter theme sounds great and will end up being quite something as you keep building onto it. I am a big fan of everything white during the holiday season because many times we don't get snow here (although we're only 5 hours south of you here in the Midwest) and if it's dull and gray outside at least the interior seems like a winter wonderland if you go with that theme.

I usually do 3-4 themed trees, but since we are in transition (we're hoping to buy a house soon and have been searching diligently with somewhat successful results), I opted not to go crazy with pulling everything out of storage in case we need to pack it all up and move it again in the near future. So, I have a little 4.5' tree that is actually meant to be outside (it's in an urn for crying out loud) that I just decorated with white and silver ornaments that I pulled from my "odds and ends" that were mixed in with my 178,234,567 bins of holiday decor. It is nothing phenomenal, and it needs some work/additional ornaments (and a topper) but it's better than Charlie Brown's, eh? LOL

ETA: What must go through kitties' heads when their humans bring trees inside and put shiny/colorful things in them? "WHY AREN'T THERE BIRDS IN THIS TREE???!!! THERE ARE SUPPOSED TO BE BIRDS AND CRITTERZ I CAN HAZ!" Don't you suppose? I mean, they must think that the outdoors is coming in and that they have to defend their territory, plus get "treats."

 

[geckodani]

best.thread.ever.

Haven, I'm telling ya, go get a swirly topiary and decorate it with Chanukah ornaments. Call it the Chanukah topiary. Otherwise known as the Chanukah Bush amongst my Jewish friends.

 

[Diamond Princess]

Ohhh I looove this thread! Everyone's trees look absolutely AMAZING! We have just settled into our new home so don't mind the bare walls- here is a picture of my pride and joy!

 

[Diamond Princess]

I managed to capture my kitty, Chloe Bug, in this one! Her sister, Sydney, didn't want ANY part of the Christmas photo shoot!

 

[rainwood]

We do the same tree theme every year. It's an old-fashioned tree with cloth ornaments, plaid ribbons tied in bows, white lights, and straw and brass bead garlands. We've been collecting the ornaments for years - from when we first started dating to now - so it's a snapshot of our entire life together. I love it so much I never change it, just add to it.

http://www.pricescope.com/forum/files/icp/Christmas Bear Ornament

[ATTACH=full]263727[/ATTACH]

 

[Denise222]

I love this thread. I love Christmas. I'm not done with my tree or decorating yet but decided to post as is and look what I found under the tree

 

[Steel]

I love all the trees and think it is so funny that so many PS'ers are cat crazy

 

[lulu]

Thank you everyone for this Christmas fix. It's my favorite time of year and we're stuck in Florida waiting for our kitty to heal up after surgery. (No offense to Floridians because I am one too, but I just can't get into the holiday spirit here.) In Michigan there's snow and all my decorations are there. Hopefully Margaret will be well enough to travel in the car in about 10 days. Meanwhile I'll keep visiting this thread.

 

[Haven]

These trees are all so beautiful!

Rainwood--Do you have any more pictures of your old-fashioned tree? That little glimpse has me dreaming of a tree of my own.

(I bought white and gold tinsel last night. And three giant ornaments.)

 

[Diamond Princess]

Rainwood- I loooove your tree and the memories involved in creating it!

Steal- Yes, there seems to be quite a few cat people around these parts.

I should have prefaced as to why my kitty, Sydney, doesn't like being involved in the Christmas photo shoots. Here's a glimpse of Christmas past for Sydney Bear and Chloe Bug dressed as Santa and a Reindeer! Enjoy!!!

 

[rainwood]

These trees are all so beautiful!

Rainwood--Do you have any more pictures of your old-fashioned tree? That little glimpse has me dreaming of a tree of my own.

(I bought white and gold tinsel last night. And three giant ornaments.)

Haven -

I'm so glad you liked the tree! Here's a photo of the tree a few years ago. I'll also try to do another close-up for some of the details.

The ribbon is just inexpensive red plaid ribbon and I save it and iron it every year then tie bows on the ends of the boughs, plus a larger bow on top. I first got the idea for the cloth ornaments from my childhood where we grew up with cats and the tree went over several years in a row with a cat riding it all the way down. We don't have cats now but we have had a dog tail or two wag some of the ornaments off so it's good they're unbreakable. These kind of ornaments are harder to find now, but I usually find something every year or two, often at craft fairs.

The brass bead garlands were just some drugstore cheapies from a few years ago. I don't remember when or where I got the straw garlands.

 

[rainwood]

Here's my favorite Christmas wreath. The woven vines and moss and cinnamon sticks are real. It even still smells like cinnamon even though we bought this at least 25 years ago! I've never seen another one like it, and I'd be heartbroken if anything ever happened to it.

 

[partgypsy]

Thank you everyone for posting your pictures they fill me with happiness . On Monday I went to work and then when I was leaving the christmas decorations had been placed in the lobby (Christmas tree, wreathes, poinsettas in the planters) and it made me so cheerful! I like to put up the Christmas tree on the early side while he likes to wait at the last minute. I'd like to get it this weekend, but not sure if he's ready .

Our tree is definitely of the colored lights, lots of kids and kitcsh ornaments variety. We actually started out with a more spare tree, with many old German painted glass ornaments (so beautiful!) but the cat/kids did such a number on them, the few we have left we either put at the top of the tree and the ones with broken tops I put in a little metal sleigh for display. So now the majority of our ornaments are nonbreakable.

I have a bunch of gifts still in boxes that need to be wrapped. One thing I'd love to get I saw in a catalog is a "santa" bag, a big bag in velvet and fake fur to stow all the presents in ahead of time. I haven't done any shopping for Christmas decorations yet (lights) so I will see if there is anything like that in the stores before I order it online.

 

[radiantquest]

If anyone was wondering...My tree is DESTROYED! My new kitten has killed nearly all the ornaments. We have had about 15 glass ball casulaties. There is a game she is playing that involves climbing up the middle of the tree finding a nice ornament then jumping straight out, grabbing the ball on the way, slamming it to the ground and batting it about until she deems that it is far enough away from the tree. Then she runs back over to the tree and starts all over again. We now have no ornaments on the tree except for the top 2 ft where she cannot get to.

I think that it would be fun to post the trees of familys that have fur-children at the end of the season and see everyones kitty improved trees.

 

[Jessie702]

Oh, and heres one more because I cant pass up posting a picture with her mouth open.

HaHaHa....that is so cute radiant....so cute.