This is why we can't have nice things...

[eregyrn]

Time that Xmas tree has been up: 15 minutes.

Number of times cats have been up on the table to investigate/mess with it: 5 (3 for Morgan, 2 for Emily).

*sigh* This tree is goin' over at some point this holiday season, I can just FEEL it.


Due to some furniture rearranging, I didn't think that I would have room to put up the Big Tree this year, so I just went out and scoured Target for the 4.5' model that I could put on my lovely Turkish tile table. Pre-strung with white lights, natch. But it makes me nervous, because table + tree + windows = endless temptation for cats, apparently.

Speaking of whom, I also realized I had a problem. Last year, I decorated the tree entirely in Scandinavian straw ornaments, which was nice, (although raqs pronounced it "pallid", what with the straw and the white lights). The cats (for which, really, read "Morgan") systematically removed a great number of the ornaments and turned them into cat toys. Any they could reach, that is. And some that I would have thought they couldn't.

Now, that was my first Xmas with Morgan. And I just realized... I don't know that I can risk putting my grandmother's glass ornaments on the tree, given the possibility either of it being knocked over or of intrepid cats fishing the ornaments off for toys. Again, I have to blame Morgan, because Emily's never really bothered them that much. But now I'm all nervous, and... I don't want to lose any more of those. They're too precious. (Perhaps I shall get one of those ornament-tree thingies for display and put it where the cats never look and never go and can't reach. That could work.)

Anyway, so, I needed unbreakable ornaments. Do you know how hard those are to find? Geez. Eight skillion choices of glass ornaments, oh sure, but you'd think that our mastery of plastics technology would allow us to make more choices of ornaments that LOOK like glass but, important, AREN'T.

So it's a little tree, and I need to fix myself some highly alcoholic eggnog before decorating it, but it's not the Charlie Brown Christmas Tree, so that's okay, I guess.

(NOTE: Urban Outfitters is selling, no joke, the Charlie Brown Christmas Tree. If you go to their website -- I'm too lazy to link right now, maybe later -- you can probably find it. It's, like, the little wooden cross-stand with the single branch with about three clusters of long-needle pine, and a single red bulb. I'm not sure whether that's charming or appalling.)

ETA: Huh. Weird. Yes, they're selling the tree, but it's not actually on their website. I had to hunt up the catalog to be sure it wasn't just a prop. But if you go HERE you can see it at lower right. Except if you click it, it takes you to a place where... it isn't. Although they *do* have a 6' pink tinsel tree. o.O

Comments

[jenlev.livejournal.com]

oh yes, cats and dogs *know* the tree is for their entertainment. my sister puts her various antique glass balls around the house in wooden bowls. they're still enjoyable, and the dog leaves them alone.

hee! a charlie brown christmas tree indeed. sounds like my mother's house. although hers are because she goes out into the back 40 and grabs one. ;)

good luck with the process. *hugs*

[raqs.livejournal.com]

remember those styrofoam balls we got once that were covered with colored thread? those were perfect for cat houses.

um. why did you NEED to fix yourself highly alcoholic eggnog? or did you just WANT to? did you see altom making nog on good eats tonight?

[eregyrn.livejournal.com]

eta the link to a pic of the tree, only you can't *actually* buy the tree, even though you're supposed to be able to.

somehow, it seems so ironically recursive. "Christmas has become too commercial", indeed.

[eregyrn.livejournal.com]

Had I gone into the long, involved story about how many stores I had to visit (in the arctic gale-force winds) to find the tree in stock and then how long it took to hunt down the unbreakable ornaments, the NEED for the highly alcoholic eggnog would make more sense. (Also, had I gone into the part where I got it home and put it up and plugged it in only to find that the top section wouldn't light, and the horror that changing a fuse involved, and that didn't even fix the problem, and thinking, oh hell, I'm supposed to check every single fucking little lightbulb? but getting lucky and actually finding the missing bulb after only checking a dozen or so, and that fixed it.)

Ho ho ho... Pass the rum.

But yes -- wanted to. Mainly because, yes, I DID happen to see that Good Eats, and it totally made me want to make my own eggnog. Although I prefer the rum to the bourbon. (Yeah, yeah, I know, you like bourbon.)

Yeah, those styrofoam balls were useful. I still have a few, but not that many. I could have put the antique ornaments up high and used all the styrofoam down low, but that's lopsided, and I was still too paranoid to do it. (I really am half expecting to be woken up by the sound of crashing tree, or to come home and find the tree on the floor -- but as it is now, that won't really hurt anything on it. Though if it does happen during the night, I may just have a heart-attack.)

I don't know where this sudden paranoia came from. But there it is.

Plus, you think you can find MORE of those styrofoam balls now? Do you even remember where we got them? Probably Ames -- alas, Ames. At any rate, tar-JAY did not have them.

[m0usegrrl.livejournal.com]

o_0 ...a 6' pink tinsel tree... =twitches uncontrollably=

[eregyrn.livejournal.com]

Also, dude, did you hear me?

6' PINK TINSEL tree.

[tafkarfanfic.livejournal.com]

For the record - I thought your Xmas tree was breathtaking last year.

[jenlev.livejournal.com]

heh heh heh, yup, definitely it's existential irony that even the charlie brown xmas tree is out of reach to those who click on the photo with hope. *bg*

[guyelfkin.livejournal.com]

I don't know that I can risk putting my grandmother's glass ornaments on the tree,

Could you attach them at regular intervals to a string or ribbon and stringing it up somewhere out of reach of the cats?

Teddy

[eregyrn.livejournal.com]

Thank you. :) It *was* pretty, but I didn't want to do a copy of it this year.

[eregyrn.livejournal.com]

Yeah, that may be what I end up doing, if I can't find one of these tree-like things that they make for you to display ornaments on. Because I can't quite figure out where to get one.

[guyelfkin.livejournal.com]

I can't quite figure out where to get one.

Mass email everyone in thwe area that you can and ask if anyone knows? Unless. of course, they all ready your LJin which case, there's not much point

Good luck

Teddy