It's half past November, so of course I'm in the midst of putting up all of the Christmas trees. Before you try to give me grief about the fact that there are eleven Christmas trees fully lit and decorated in my house, two things:
1. Did you hear that little thing about Tangerine Mussolini getting elected? LET ME HAVE MY HAPPY, DAMMIT.
2. I'm not even halfway done and there are just a few days separating us from Thanksgiving. I probably won't finish by then, especially if people keep giving me grief. I have to buy a new tree every time someone complains about what I do in my own home, you know.
So, I'm allowed to have some Christmas trees and stuff. We're all in agreement? We're all in agreement.
Ahem.
Most of the trees go up pretty easily, but there is one that is rather beastly. I've had help a bunch of years in a row, which is good because I find joy in having someone look at me like I'm nuts when I haul out six tubs of ornaments.
Six REALLY FULL tubs of ornaments.
The thing about the beastly tree is that there isn't much tree showing when it's fully decorated. The trick to a super matchy tree with cheap ornaments is that you need ALL of the cheap ornaments. Overkill is good. Promise.
It takes a few hours to achieve overkill perfection. Even with multiple people helping.
This year it wasn't just the adults who helped. Alexis was also genuinely helpful. She was in charge of many parts of the tree decorating and did most of her work happily. She's a fifth grader, though, so I think she's contractually obligated to do at least a little whining. So she did. She whined about all of the work.
The friend that was helping us is all in on my crazy, so she was poking back at Alexis' whining. It reached a point where Alexis was asked how many trees she would have when she's an adult. 20 plus like me?
Alexis was quick to clarify that she's nowhere near as crazy about Christmas trees as I am. She explained that they are too much work so she would be limiting herself to a nice, sane number of trees.
Like 10.
Seriously.
Alexis thinks 10 Christmas trees is a nice, low, sane number.
My work here is done, people.
