I better post this one before the holidays slip too far behind us.  As I take the ornaments off the tree, it begins to look naked and sad.  Our tree is quite crispy now and I’m not looking forward to picking up the needles, but its worth it.  We’ve always had a live tree and cutting down the biggest one that would fit in our house was always the goal growing up. The one (and only) time my sister asked me to pick out a tree for Dad to bring down to Virginia for her, I obeyed her height requirement but found the fattest tree out there.  They now fondly laugh about the year their tree filled the whole dining room, the only place it could fit, but she was not so pleased at the time..