One finger...

So I guess Christmas is officially upon us. We went out with my parents to pick out our xmas trees at a local tree farm a few weekends ago, before we got too inundated with snow. Cutting your own Christmas tree is a little like catching and eating your own fish, or growing your own tomatoes to make sauce or something. You appreciate the tree's (fish's, or veggie's) sacrifice a bit more if you actually have to put the saw to it yourself and haul it to your car. It's either that or you start to feel a little evil about the whole thing... As Andy put it, "Which one of you trees wants to be cut down in the prime of life for our fanciful holiday enjoyment?"

ANYway, we got a tree and we set up it last weekend after much hemming and hawing about whether we should even decorate it, or decorate only the top half, or tie it to the rafters with monofilament line so that it can't be pulled over by a toddler. In the end we decided not to rig up anything that might land us in this year's Darwin Awards, and resolved that we would just teach Aiden to "be gentle and respectful" of this giant, glowing, multicolored spectacle that miraculously appeared in his playroom while he was sleeping.

Ha! Good luck!

Actually, after a week of the tree it's not going too badly. Every time he heads for the tree we say "One finger..." which means that is all he's supposed to use to touch the lights and the sparkly ornaments. When he thinks we're not looking he does grab at things with 5-finger abandon, but mostly we're looking. So far, so good...