Thursday, December 5, 2013

A Tale of A Christmas Tree

A few years ago I purchased a lovely, 7 foot, pre-lit, fake Spruce Christmas tree.  It's skinnier than the old one so it doesn't take up as much space and I thought it would be easier.  I used to spend several hours lighting the old tree row by row as I put it together, it looked really pretty but it's hard work.  So pre-lit was an idea my back could get behind!

I set the skinny tree up last night only to find that it had three different "stripes" of NO lights!  I hit up three stores looking for a tester and then spent 45 minutes testing individual bulbs before I found the really bad one-you know the one that can't be replaced?  Then I read the box which says that the bulbs remain lit even if one burns out! (Of course, that doesn't include the one that can't be replaced.) I really thought about this--could I live with it like this, once decorated would it still even show?  Slept on it-got up this morning and started taking the lights off the tree to replace them with LED's (I hope).  Easy-peasy right?  WRONG!!  All I have to say is that those folks in China know how to put lights on that do. not. move!  It's either that or they pay them by the twist!! Each branch of the tree has it's own little length of lights and for every bulb there are at least three twists!  So some three or four hours later I still have two more layers of branches to remove, sigh.  Tomorrow, after I get those done, I'm off to the store to buy more lights.  

Somehow, a pre-lit tree no longer seems any easier!  Eventually, it will be really pretty and I will sit and soak up the beauty and it will light my heart.  So there!

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