tour of our christmas tree

I just finished our tree tonight and I thought I’d give you a blurry crappy cell phone photo tour of it. I mean, a blurry crappy tour is better than none, right? Well, actually, no. No, it’s not, Trace. Nonetheless, we proceed apace, undaunted by crap, which is basically how one must approach life, I suppose.

With the exception of the shiny balls on our tree — because I love shiny balls and who doesn’t, ahem — everything on our tree is paper. Most of the decorations were homemade by me eons ago when we were newlyweds and poor and starving. Now we’re oldyweds and poor and starving, so paper it is! Still!

Here we go. Do not adjust your computer screens. Do not call your ophthalmologist immediately for an appointment re: your nonexistent glaucoma. The photos are just that blurry, but let’s call it atmospheric and old timey, okay?

One of my painted paper angels and one of my “hope/joy/love” tags. These are scattered throughout. Our tree is a talker, what can I say? Oh, and I sort of drape this stuff called excelsior into and around the tree. See it poking out under the “joy” tag? It’s basically that throwaway stuff that lines the bottom of the Christmas basket you got at work filled with those snootsie Ferrero Rocher candies that everybody is supposed to like but nobody really does. But the stuff is all kinky and curly and I love the way it makes the tree sprrroing out at you. Our tree looks very …. lively in person. I can honestly say I’ve never seen another tree with excelsior on it. When I bought my supply this year for 3 whole bucks, the lady at the floral supply said, “Baskets, huh?” And I said, “Actually, I put it on my tree.” I wish I could have snapped a blurry crappy photo of the funny look she gave me, as if she were thinking, “You put trash on your tree?” Uhm, peaches, I put trash on my head, so there.

Let’s see. (Boy, these are seriously crappy photos.) On the very left is the “twist” of a wired paper ribbon I made. There are 4 sections of this on the tree. Next to it is one of my gold paper snowflakes. A “joy” tag. Another angel. A portion of the pale gold and sheer white ribbon star garland I made one year from what was at hand. You know, that said, I’m kind of surprised the whole tree isn’t done up in Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup wrappers. Maybe next year. MB and I had better get crackin’ on that now then. Lots ‘o’ Reese’s to eat.

More wired paper ribbon. In the middle of the shot, though, is one of my mom’s quilling pieces. Isn’t it gorgeous? She gave MB and I a few dozen of these for our first Christmas together. I think it’s the best present she’s ever given me. They’re so delicate and very time-consuming to make. I treasure them.

Around the bottom of our tree, I hang Christmas cards MB and I have given each other over the years. More talking on the tree! This one is my favorite. It has a quote I love from Anton Chekhov: We shall find peace. We shall hear the angels. We shall see the sky sparkling with diamonds.

More of the bottom, with one of the larger gold snowflakes hanging amongst the cards.

The top. Just a plain red papier mache star, some plaid Christmas ribbon because I’m a sucker for plaid Christmas ribbon, and a pop-up angel card from years ago. Actually, I need to futz with the lights so it looks a bit more “lit” up there.

A jumble of stuff. Clearly. (Or not so clearly.)

The tree unlit — and actually, not entirely finished in this shot. You can’t really see the full sproingy action in this photo, but it’s there, it’s there. Papery and wonky. I like how the cards and snowflakes give the tree some kicky pleats.

Daytime tree.

The tree lit up, ablaze.

Thanks for coming on this blurry crappy photo tour of our tree, pippa.