With Christmas now being less than a month away, attention is turned to setting up a fake tree or getting a real one. This family still does the real thing, and goes to chop it down no less. I know many who are very happy to have artificial trees. Due to advances in reproductive quality, most good ones look like the trees we cut down.

My husband says as long as he can go get one, this tradition will continue. I say as long as his knees can go up those hills we encounter, we might still be able to do it. It’s a little more difficult just being me and him now. It used to be a family affair, and it was fun. Now that we have to do the heavy lifting, sometimes not so much. I will admit, I love the smell of a real tree. What I don’t like is hearing my husband curse when he can’t get it into the tree stand right the first time. This has also become a tradition!

Several years back, my in-laws opted for a fake tree. This was partly due to the remodeling of their living room, where the tree goes. Cream color carpet and tree sap do not mix very well. The tree is beautiful and can be trimmed like any other. That was not even enough to convince my husband to go artificial.

So in a few weeks, we will head to our favorite tree farm, and hunt for the almost perfect Douglas Fir. We now use a battery-powered saw. Yes it might be cheating, but we had many years of manual labor. Sometimes you just have to compromise. We’ve been lucky with the weather too. Usually just cold, but one year we trudged through half a foot of snow. Yeah, that was real fun. Have to admit, it made the mood.

Pros of a fake…you can buy one with lights already on them and they don’t need watering

Pros of a real one…smells good and you can cut real greens from them

Cons of a fake….no smell and you can’t cuss at the lights when they don’t work

Cons of a real one…..needs watering and you are still finding needles in August

So there you go! If you have a fake one, lucky you, because you are probably looking at it now.

And if you are getting a real one like we will be, well be patient. It will no doubt be worth the wait!