O Tannenbaum, o árbol de Navidad

As I have mentioned, we are doing a Mexican-themed Christmas Eve this year. Today we brought the tree up from the basement and Tom got the lights all plugged in and turned on while the cats watched yet another change taking place in their environment. We (Tom and I) decorated it with a bunch of the tissue paper flowers that we had made. Helen helped us figure out how to make these when she was visiting a few months back, and we decided that would be our simple decorations. The cats are curious -- they love to play with pipe cleaners and the tissue paper -- but we figure they won't be able to do any significant damage.

Realizing that photos do not do justice to the wonder of this creation, I nonetheless offer some views herewith.

Here is the tree with just the lights ... and Cassidy walking beneath it.

Tom hard at work with his designer's eye ...


Close-ups of the flowers ...


Our pseudo-shipped packages with their Mexican stamps ...


And the whole thing ...
[Tom's painting of the Streewise vendor from Chicago peering out behind the tree looks strange. I think maybe it represents Santa's evil twin watching to find all those who have been naughty.]