A Fake Christmas

Every year since 1985, the Cooper family has gone to the Christmas tree lot behind Mayfair Hardware on 33rd Street and bought a Christmas tree.  We have done the same thing since we have been married, braving -40 below weather and storms to get a good cheap Christmas tree in this HUGE lot that has trees stocked 15 feet high.  It’s a proud Cooper family tradition.

Today, that tradition ended as we bought an artificial Christmas tree this year.  XS Cargo had artificial Christmas trees on for $35 this week.  We spend about $20 for a real tree now and by next year, we will have saved money.  I wasn’t thrilled with the idea at first because growing up we had a sad and pathetic looking artificial tree.  You know, the kind that makes you hate Christmas.  The kind that even Charlie Brown spits on while looking for Christmas trees.

When we went over to XS Cargo, they had one decorated but it didn’t look that good.  The staff had done a pretty poor job with it and it wasn’t even set up correctly.  We decided to take the plunge and take one home.  After fiddling with the branches for 20 minutes and then decorating it, it looks like a real fir tree which made all of us happy.  We waited until Mark was home from school to decorate it and he was more then happy to help out with only one decoration getting dropped.  Although Jordon had to grab me twice to keep me from stepping on some Christmas lights.  It is 7 feet hight and looks like an Oregon fir tree.

Now we won’t have any of that nice fir smell but I won’t miss checking the tree for water every day or cleaning up pine needles when we toss it out on December 26th.

As for why the tree goes up so early at our house, there is a great story behind that.  Growing up, Jordon and Lee had a great-Aunt named Aunt Beth.  She never married but would could from Regina to Calgary and later Saskatoon for every holiday.  She treated Jordon, Lee, and Jolene as her grandkids and would show up around December 15th every year.  Now, Aunt Beth was great but she smoked.  Jordon doesn’t remember how many packs but he jokes that she had a multi-carton a day habit.  The Cooper’s were a non-smoking family and Aunt Beth’s Player’s Light would overwhelm the smell of the pine within moments.  One year in Calgary, Marion hosted a Christmas party for the ladies of the church and had the tree up early.  They so enjoyed the tree up early and the smell of pine without the smoke, they put it up every year early.  I kind of adopted the tradition from Jordon.  Growing up and being born on December 13th, I always wanted the tree up after my birthday as my birthday was often lost in the Christmas rush.  Now that I am older and because Jordon always puts together a nice Christmas party for me, I don’t mind the Christmas tree up early.  Even if it is a fake tree.