This has been a tricky year for planning the Christmas holiday. My son is going to spend the holiday with his dad and I was planning to go to my parents’ house in Michigan. Unfortunately scheduling issues got in the way and I’m going to be spending Christmas at home and my parents are going to bring Miles back for me just after the holiday. This will be my first Christmas at home alone, so I thought I would make the best of it.
We haven’t bought a tree since we lived in Chicago, since we typically travel for the holiday, but now that I’m going to be home, I wanted my house to be a little festive. After poking around my closets, I realized that all of my tree accessories were still in my parents’ garage and I would have to buy all new accessories in addition to a tree! I didn’t really want to start all over again so I tried to think of alternatives.
I saw a birch tree on Pinterest, but I really didn’t see myself going into the woods to chop down branches, and the custom made ones were more expensive than real Christmas trees. I then came across a pin from a few years ago of a tree made out of books. That’s what I decided to do. I would make a Christmas tree out of books.
I did a bit of research on the web for instruction and called my friend to come over and help. I started gathering most of the books I had and sorted them by size and width. Then basically I began to wing it!
I started with two layers to make sure that I was happy with the shape and size and then I began to layer them on top of each other, using smaller books as I reached the top. I thought about color coordinating the spines, but I didn’t have that many books, so I focused on subject. I used as many art and cookbooks as I could find.
Then I added a Harry Potter and Diary of a Wimpy Kid layer for Miles. For the last book, I went with a favorite; The Food Lover’s Companion.
After some debate over how many strings of lights to use (I went with 3), I plugged them in and fell in love. It looked like a tree!
The only thing missing was a tree topper, which I found a couple of days later at Cost Plus. Miles and I were very happy.
Last year I bought a miniature Christmas tree from Whole Foods complete with lights and bulbs. I decided to take the string of lights and show my Simpson’s Lego house a little love and put lights on the roof.
Now I’m excited just thinking about celebrating Christmas with my family when they come to my home just after the holiday. In the meantime, I think I will catch up on all the movies I’ve wanted to see over the past couple of months and check out a double, triple feature!
neurotic baker 