Pink La Vie: 3 STEPS FOR A SUSTAINABLE CHRISTMAS TREE

Christmas was near and I was still without a tree. Between December flying by and a little....a lot of procrastination I was in a dilemma.

This story started one cold day okay it was not that cold we do live in Florida, but my husband and I decided to go out and start looking for the perfect tree. Our hunting soon became shocking not because we couldn't find any trees, but because the tree prices were insane...insane I say.

We drove to different spots and the places were packed. I was amazed to see how many people did not mind paying those high prices..it is Christmas and we all go wild right?

Something caught my eyes in all the places we stopped. It was the system. You pick a tree, you walk to the front, they trim the tree for you, they wrap it and put it on top of your car and off you go. Everybody is happy and with a big smile on their faces, it was a picture perfect. Here I was on the other side of that picture perfect moment without a tree, however I did have a great idea. At each tree farm there are piles of trimmings left over. Some where half of a tree and some where just simple branches It look like they were trash.

I picked one up and said to my husband "This is going to be our tree". He looked at me funny, so I explain to him the whole plan that i had in my head. Like always he was on board with my plan. We walked to the front and asked the guys if we could take some of the left over trimmings. We offered to pay for them but he insisted they where Free...FREE?????? DONE!!! we bundled up loads of them and put them in our car. Like I said before, it was an idea, but I wasn't sure it was going to work, Fortunately it did.

Here is how a bunch of trimmings became a tree again. My sustainable Christmas Tree

STEP ONE

We sorted the pieces on the floor by size. The larger fan shaped pieces would be the body while the smaller trimmings would be used to fill in after.

STEP TWO

Find a frame like this to use as an anchor for the large pieces. Start from the middle. Insert the pieces so that the branches curl up and back towards the tree. Fill in to cover the frame as much as you can. You can tie any of the pieces to ensure they are stable. Use the smaller pieces to fill in. Lastly find a base trimming to slide in underneath.