To have a Tree, or not to have a Tree, that is the question

Well Most Excellent Blog Readers, the question has arisen in the Messy household: should we get a Christmas Tree this year. It is a question fraught with emotion (mostly mine) as in all our 8 years of marriage (eek!) we have never had a Christmas Tree of our very own. Tinsel, yes; Decorations, yes; Holly, yes but an actual tree (alive or dead).....um, NO.

Mostly we have never really had the space to store a tree and all the accompanying trimmings, so we have just made do with decorations strung festively about in an effort to create some Christmas spirit. I suspect we have a box of gaudy baubles (marked "Fragile: Christmas Decorations") in every State of Australia we have ever lived in: Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne.

However, given that we are in London, and fresh trees are readily available, I raised the issue with Mr Messy about whether we might have a tree this year. His answer? "If it costs less than £10 you can get one."

"£10!!!! ARE you SERIOUS???? You can't even buy a needle off a tree for that amount of money!" I mean, I don't want a Fraser Fir, or a Supreme Nordman Fir or even a Blue Spruce- a regular ole Scots pine will do. But they DO cost more than a tenner....ummm, considerably more :(

So, unfortunately dear blog readers, this year we will once again be Without Tree. Instead I will be forced to frequent the shops of Marylebone, Pimlico and Columbia Road to breathe in the scent of pine and citrus, touch the spindly needles and delight in the twinkly lights and lavish decorations. Oh, and I can be smug in the knowledge that once New Years Day rolls around, I, for one, won't be dragging a half dead tree through the flat, down the stairs and out the front door leaving a pine forest of razor sharp needles in my wake...or trying to find a hiding space for the box marked "Fragile: Christmas Decorations"!