My OCD '08 Christmas tree.

1.) Ornaments must hang freely, not touching any branches.

2.) Ornaments that are identical must not be located in the same proximity. Pretty much impossible with this many ornaments. I'm guessing...100 or more?

3.) Ornaments in similar color must not be located in the same proximity. Same as above.

4.) All open spaces in between branches must have an ornament.

5.) Smaller ornaments must be purchased for fill-ins.

6.) Every 5 minutes is review time; stand back, observe ornaments on tree, reposition/swap if necessary. And it's always necessary.

7.) Ornaments of special interest/expensive must be placed towards the top of the tree to avoid 10 tiny fingers. Or 40 tiny fingers if you consider I've got 4 miniatures.

8.) Always, always wear long sleeves when opening/separating branches.

9.) Praise the good Lord that my little Chocolate Truffle has absolutely no interest in either tree.

10.) Breathe a sigh of relief when tree is up, complete & gorgeous!

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I have seriously been MIA. Hubby was out of town again this week, left Monday & was not to return until Friday - low & behold they kicked bootie in MN & he got home today! So I have been super, super busy.

When I went to decorate the tree, I noticed that when hubby put up the tree, he opened the branches all wrong. More like ridiculous. He'll pull one branch up, one branch down. One branch up, one branch down. So it looked like a bunch of fork prongs sticking straight up & straight down. Um...no. So I had to redo the entire tree before decorating! Hence #8. My hands & arms are torn to shreds. That's the first thing he noticed when he got home - my manual labor scars.

I'm guessing it took approximately 6+ hours over a course of 3 or 4 days to decorate my tree because of all the interruptions. And Mercedes has a cold. And I'm searching for a Boxer which is entirely too time consuming. I had no idea. And every night I have gone to bed exhausted & extremely sad due to what I have read each night regarding the treatment of dogs. Craigslist is just flat out nasty, with people bickering & cursing each other, dogs being euthanized (posted by shelters) - I guess people get innocent dogs, decide they don't want them & then just give them to anyone who'll take them. And if those people don't want them, the process starts all over again. A hard lesson learned for someone (me) who is such an animal lover. Most nights I shook my head in disbelief. How in the world can people be so cruel to animals?

We still have a lot of Christmas preparations to complete & I'm beginning to stress because I don't think we'll get it done. But by the grace of God, every year we do.

Hope your week is fantastic! Ü