Moroni on My Tree and Other Christmas Awesomeness

Last night was date night, the first one we have had in a long while.  I tried very hard to be sneaky and dropped Chris off at Target so that I could pick up his birthday gift.  I don't think that worked as well as I thought it would, but what's a girl to do?  He is my eternal companion; God hath joined us, and I think as a couple, we take that to a literal extreme.  It makes our lives a little difficult, but a lot of fun, especially around Christmas and birthdays.

After eating too much, we stopped to pick up some lights for the tree.  My awesome husband picked up a box of C-7's and said "I like these!"  For those of you who haven't a clue what I'm talking about, C-7's are your traditional, large-bulb Christmas lights.  They adorned every Christmas tree my mom ever put up until my freshman year in college.  That is to say, I think they were as old, if not older, than me. 

My sister was checking the lights.  What happened next has gone down in history as an Unfortunate Event of Illumination.  There was a spark, a flame, some singed paint on the wall, and a very loud expletive.  Thankfully, Shannon wasn't hurt, but since then, Mom's house has been decorated with tiny twinkle lights made after the year 2000. 

We faced a bit of a conundrum when it came to the angel.  The tree-topper angel I had hoped to use was, in fact, made more for a twelve foot tree.  When I put her on the top of our little five-footer, her skirts swallowed up nearly a third of the branches.  It looked awful.  I picked up the figure of Moroni, and before I could utter the words "Wouldn't we be Mormodorks if..." he was blowing his trumpet from the top of the tree.  It's awesome.

Yes, that's Maggie, our cat, underneath the tree.  She likes the warmth of the bulbs and the soft velvet blanket we're using as a tree skirt.  Silly kitty.

 

Oh, and... do you see the packages in this picture?  Those are gifts for me, from my husband.  He says that because they are in decorative boxes, they're wrapped already.  I disagree.  Who's right?  (Not that it matters, I pouted for about five minutes.  For once, it didn't work.)

How are your preparations going for the holiday?  I have a long ways to go.  Somehow or other, my house kind of exploded again after Thanksgiving.

I am ashamed.