Exchanging Greens

Outside, all is still covered in snow.

Inside, we have made a few changes, switching this green:

 for this one:

I love all babies, including baby leaves!

Sometimes, a man's gotta do what a man's gotta do.

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This weekend, Howard helped his reluctant wife (that would be me) denude the no-longer-very-fresh

fir tree in the sunroom.  All things considered, I think it still looked pretty darn good.

For a dead tree.

Four-plus Rubbermaid containers of ornaments later, there were still 1500 lights to come off.

That's Howard's job.

Mama don't do no lights.

A 9-foot tree is a hefty bugger.

Howard grabbed it cozily around its middle

and waltzed it out, up the stone steps, up the driveway, to the curb,

from whence it will depart sometime this week for its future as mulch.

When he came back in the house, he said, "I got a few pine needles in my ear.

And . . . I think I swallowed some."

Now I wish I'd gotten pictures of that.  At least it's good fiber.

 After the Annual Great Needle Suck-Up by the vacuum,

Howard got to work replacing the sunroom ceiling fixture.

By the way, it didn't take him from daylight to dark to do this - in between we went out!

Ta-Da!  Back to normal.

 Normal, but kind of dull, compared to this:

Christmas trees do not photograph well in daylight.  Neither do I.

But -- 2011 will bring another Christmas, another monster tree to deck,

and another January weekend when my man does what he has to do:

force me to say goodbye to the Season.

 I put just a bowl of ivy on the table.  And cough drops; I cough in cold weather.

 Pewter candlesticks I got at Goodwill some months back.

Ditto the silverplate Revere bowl holding the ivy.

And now it's up to the attic with the storage bins.  There are more to fill,

but I'll leave those till tomorrow when the weather will probably be brutal and I'll be glad to be inside.

Happy Monday!  -- Cass

Link Parties:

Metamorphosis Monday, at Between Naps On the Porch.  Visit Susan, click here!
Mosaic Monday at Little Red House.  Click here, say Hi to Mary!
At The House In The Roses, it's Show Off Your Cottage Monday.  Visit Cielo by clicking here.