You get what you pay for

So I spent the majority of the day today Christmas shopping and am happy to say that I am pretty much done. All the kids are bought for, as are the gifts for the family present exchange among the adults. Scott and I aren't buying each other gifts because of our current financial status so that's one less thing to fret about... he is always so hard to buy for and never really wants or asks for anything.

Now to the topic of my posting... you get what you pay for. Against Scott's wishes I bought an artificial tree this year. We've had a real one for the last 6 years because he grew up with real ones and insisted on it. I grew up with an artifical one so all of the hassle that surrounds having a real one was just too much for me to deal with this year. We were away last weekend, are away again this weekend, and then leave on the 20th to start our "Christmas Roadtrip" to visit both of our families - in my opinion, we weren't going to be here enough this month to warrant getting a real tree. Besides that, the living room in the house we're renting is small and even after rearranging furniture we couldn't find a great place to put it where 1. Josh wouldn't get at it, 2. Kody wouldn't get at it, and 3. it wouldn't get sap on our couch.

I bought a 4 1/2 foot tree for $29.99 at Target and on the box it looked fairly decent (see above pic). Well, when we opened it and set it up I swear to you it looked like a Charlie Brown tree. I am so mad! Now I'm going to have to go back to Target, return the darn thing, and search for another suitable one. Bah Humbug!