Hola! Today I did epic duty and individually applied and then twisted, twined and tweaked 590 lights on my Christmas tree. I did not buy a pre-lit tree, after experiencing the slow death of lights on my previous 6.5' tree that served me well for 10-11 years. Each year for the last 3 years of her life, she lost more lights and I was helpless and clueless on how to fix them. I couldn't wrap my head around lights on half the tree still working after 10 years, and half the lights on the tree just deciding to die after 8, 9 and 10 years.
So - today was suck it up Jan, get the lights on the tree! I got the box filled with lights from basement storage and spent about 3 hours doing my best to weave the strands of lights in and out of all the branches. I started at the bottom of the tree as a decorator on Youtube told me I should do, and with one last string of 120 lights to work up to the top of the tree thinking I'd have more than enough, I see it looks a bit sparse of lights at the top 15 inches or so. DRAT! I will pick up one more box of lights if I can find something in LED "warm white" at the supermarket tomorrow. Sigh.
Then I wanted to put the ribbon on. I pretty much ran out of steam, but no excuses. There is ribbon on the tree. Am I happy with how that ribbon looks? Nope. It is a far far cry from Ramon at Home's gorgeous trees with perfect ribbon that he makes it look so easy to do - and I can't do it! Right now I'm thinking I'll take it off tomorrow, but maybe I just need to tweak it some.
I am feeling rather inadequate right now. As punishment for failing Christmas Tree Ribbon Application 101, I'm going to spend the evening re-watching every Ramon at Home video on how to decorate a Christmas tree. For your viewing "pleasure," below are two shots of the tree with the lights (and the ribbon) on it. I have started on the tree topper as well, and discovered a box of picks and florals that I ordered at the end of last season that I totally forgot about. I'll be using some of them on 2021's tree. Right now I'm not happy with the status of the tree topper either, it needs more pizzzaaaazzzz!
