Decking My Halls - Part 4, The Christmas Tree!

We finally got our tree up on Monday.  I had to wait for it to ship since I just purchased this new tree from Home Depot on line the day after Thanksgiving.  We needed a new tree for this house since our old 7 ft. tree looked way too short with our 10ft. ceilings (plus our old tree was not of the "pre-lit" variety, I'm excited for that upgrade!).  After some searching I decided on this one because it had good reviews, a good warranty, a lot of lights and branches, and it was a decent price (on sale it was $297 and they offered free shipping!).

Years ago I bought a red berry garland from Target and then cut it apart to create a bunch of berry "sprigs" that I could poke in the branches all over the tree.  Most of the balls on the tree are silver, some are large jingle bells.  I also have quite a few large metal stars that I spray painted red and use for ornaments.  The last thing I add to my tree are about 12-15 of these wire star strands, it adds some subtle sparkle.

at the end of the season I wrap them around my hand to create a small wire circle, then the next year when I  pull apart the wire circle it has a nice curly-cue effect that works well to stretch between the branches of the tree.

I'm not going to lie, it took FOREVER to spread all the branches out to make the tree look natural, I am hoping that since it is brand new -this year was the worst that process will ever be!  Otherwise I am really happy with it!