Kill a tree for baby Jesus?

Sorry folks, I know that might be sort of crude but I have always been a little horrified that we celebrate Christmas by cutting down a healthy tree, decorate it and then throw it away. I know, I know, it can get recycled or chipped down for mulch but there is something about it that really bums me out.

We have tried buying a tree in a container that we could plant outside after Christmas. It never seemed to work and we killed it anyway.

Which is why so many people go out and get fake trees I suppose. My mom has one that gets put together like a puzzle each year which is great but no wonderful pine smell. And, no, I don't care what they say, you can not buy it in a spray can.

Yes, we have purchased Christmas trees before and let me say, they are damn expensive! I remember a particularly lovely little table top Nobel that we got when Shea was just crawling. We thought he would be less likely that he would ransack the tree if it was up on a table. Mission accomplished but $50!!!

Our usual way around it is one of Jake's fabulous inventions that I wish we could market and sell. The "Build your own tree". It is simply a 8 foot 4x4 cedar post with holes drilled on 3 sides over the entire length. He mounted it on a rectangle of plywood so that it would stand and voila'; Christmas Tree alternative.

Every year, I go out to the conifers in our yard and cut a bunch of branches, whittle the ends so they can fit into the holes and bring it on in ready to decorate. Over the years, Jake has enlarged the holes at the bottom so that I could put in larger branches and smaller ones as I go up.

Yesterday was a beautiful, rainless day so I set ours up. I suppose it is a little early because the branches will be dry and brittle by the end of the season. But I don't like the tree being up much past Christmas anyway. For some reason, I find it really depressing.

So, it's done. We all had a really fun time going through the ornament boxes and decorating the tree and, of course, it smells wonderful.

Sure, our yard trees got a little prune but we saved some serious green and didn't have to kill a tree for Jesus.