trim up the tree with christma-- wait! get the power tools!

Power tools and wine. The only way to get your tree up at Christmas. If you don't do it that way, well then, you're just doing it wrong, buck-o!We had to get a new tree stand this year since my old one was finally put to rest last year. We got a nice plastic, snowflake shaped one for $9 at Wal-Mart. Only the holes in it for the eyelet screw things were too small. So Shawn had to get out the drill and make them slightly bigger. We got our tree yesterday afternoon. I think that's the first time I didn't get it on a Friday night since I left home. Also, we got it one weekend earlier, only because of the way the days fell, I felt like next Friday wouldn't allow me to have it up long enough. We didn't do anything to it yesterday though. Just got it up in the tree stand and let the branches fall. Shawn hadn't been out shopping yet (well, neither had I really) and didn't have my ornament so we didn't decorate last night. Truth be told, I didn't really like the one I originally got him so I was glad we waited because I found something cuter today at a craft fair I went to with my sister and brother-in-law.This afternoon it snowed. I think it was waiting for us to have our tree. It actually looks like Christmas out there. (We got less than an inch, but it made things happy and white!) So tonight we did up the tree! And now, as always I shall bore you with photos of the event (which was pretty uneventful all told).Pretty lights on the tree. I would leave it like that if I didn't have so many gosh darn ornaments.My ornament from Shawn. A box of Cheerios with a Santa hat on it. HAHAHAHAHAH! It's so cheesy it's hilarious!!And here is the only thing we put up on the tree. Ok, so we put more things up, but this got the honour of being the first one!I originally got Shawn the one on the right, a polar bear and penguin drinking hot chocolate (or something) but it just wasn't right. I couldn't find anything that really said "Shawn" to me (nor could he find the right one for me, hence the hilarity of the Cheerios box!). But today I was at a craft sale and I saw these adorable polar bears and penguins and other things all made out of oyster shells. Very cool. So I got him one of those. (On the left.)I also got these for the dogs. Well, not for the dogs, for our memories of the dogs. Note how the skinny one is Jinx and the rotund one is Annie. Heh.Second-to-last ornamental tradition - Harry Potter's severed head! Muahahahah!And me, trying to plug in that stupid angel. I am not very good with technology...Pretty glowy tree!!AND, I now have an almost complete Hallmark Puppy Love collection! Just missing that first one from 1991! But here are the rest in all their glory (and they are all on the TOP half of the tree so as to avoid being eaten like last year!)BTW, that's a lot of dogs on a Christmas tree...And so, another Christmas season has begun in the House of Pook. Oh, and the tree has already been eaten by the dogs - two branches were mysteriously in each of the dogs' spots this morning. Sigh.Merry Christmas!!