Puzzle Description:

Table topper or free-standing tree?? Real or fake?? Green or a different color?? Star or angel tree topper?? Me, I like the smell of a real tree but the cleanliness and convenience of a fake one... not a big fan of the table toppers although they are quite cute... and as much as I would love to have a pink tree, I actually do prefer the traditional green ones. And I like having a star atop my Christmas tree. ;)

#1: Jayne Paterson (TheBatterie) on Dec 1, 2011 [SPOILER]

I love having a fake tree just because of the fact that I can have it up in the middle of November. . . but green is definitely the way to go and a full size tree. I love our angel topper but usually I also prefer the star or sometimes even an oversized bow on top. But one thing is for certain I love Christmas.

Thank you for sharing, Jayne :) I love Christmas too.

Another question I meant to ask everyone is... Do you prefer ornaments to be meaningful (like homemade, representative of something significant, or gifted by someone special, etc.) or traditional commercial ornaments like shiny bells, balls, bows, etc.??

I like to change it up each year. One year I did a "Cars" theme by hanging a bunch of HotWheels and topping it with a model that my ex husband built of a '57 Bel Aire. Another year, I did a Barbie theme and dressed the tree in all Barbie stuff and topped it with the Barbie Corvette. I've also done a Coca-Cola theme and "All about dogs"... But nowadays, my husband and the kids like to put their homemade and meaningful ornaments in with the traditional shiny commercial ones. The kids are old enough to reach without knocking the tree over so I let them have full reign over the tree decorating. They actually do a pretty good job!

My girls (grown now) decorate my tree each year and try to come up with something outrageous. I'll let hollybob speak for herself on what they've done so far!

Great puzzle Alicia,we always get a real tree cause of the smell and it's so much fun getting it and putting it up. The mess isn't that bad to put up with. This year were going to cut a tree down from a farm and then have hot chocolate when we come home,we will probably do that this weekend. I love your idea of a different theme each year,i especially love the 57 Belair tree topper. We all help decorate the tree as a family,while having more hot chocolate,lol. Christmas is definitely the best time for quality family time together and for cherished memories to be made. Merry Christmas all.:)

When we had a proper house we used a real tree every year. Now that we're in a tiny cabin that's a tenth the size of our previous house, we have a tiny white tabletop tree. We used white and silver ornaments on the real trees, but last year we let our son decorate the tiny tree with his toys and drawings.

Thank you Cynthia, Aldege, and Kristen.. for sharing your Christmas traditions with us. I love hearing the stories. :)

And Aldege, I'm craving hot cocoa now. Thanks! lol.. it's still too hot here for that though. I had the windows and doors open all day today and it only brought it down to 70* in my house. Nights are a little chilly but we probably won't be ready for hot cocoa for about another month.

We had snow flurries,oh and hot chocolate...sorry for the tease.lol.:)

We put a new room on the back of our L shaped ranch... making it an S shaped ranch, I guess. Anyway, now we can have a nice tall real tree. This will be the first Christmas that my kids are both at college and not getting home in time to help with the tree. So it will be up to my husband and I to decorate this year. I would love to just have bird ornaments on the tree this year. I have quite a few...glass, metal, ceramic, blown glass, fabric, feathers but probably not enough to fill the tree. My husband goes with the rule that if you buy something new, something old must be discarded. Well I'd love to buy some more bird ornaments but couldn't possibly part with my old ornaments. So I guess it will be the assortment of my grandmother's ornaments (very old and fragile), my parents, ours and my kid's painted ornaments from when they were small. An oh yes...the salt dough ornaments!

A Cars theme tree? How fun. My Mom does little birds all over her table top tree.

Aldege, that is so cool that you can take the family to cut down a tree. That will bring such good memories, and the tree will stay fresh longer. :-)

My last remaining great grandmother (who'll be 102 years old in March) uses birds on her table topper also. :)

102! God bless her!

She's a crazy ol' bitty... nearly 102 and still plays shuffleboard every Sunday after playing piano for the church. She does her own grocery shopping and goes out with her "girlfriends" to get their nails and hair done every couple months. If I'm anything like that at 60 years old, I'll be impressed. She's amazing!!!

Most of our ornaments are special, and we get a real tree to put them on, with a lighted star on top. Most important, though, is the train that goes around under the tree!

My mom (age 88) used table top trees with birds the past several years, but this year I got her a tree-shaped wire rack to display some special ornaments she has.

My mom runs a train around her tree. My brother got her started on that when he was a baby.

Thanks for sharing everyone :)

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