Martha Stewart pre-lit tree from Home Depot

So, as I told you last week, we bought our first artificial Christmas tree this year. I mean, I always grew up having an artificial tree – one of the reasons we’ve bought a real one for the past 12 years – but this was the first I bought as an adult. I saw that the Home Depot had a nice selection, so I looked at reviews online, and decided on the Martha Stewart Living 7.5 ft Snow Fir. Online it says Snow Pine, but I’m pretty sure it’s the exact same tree!

“Why does it look so skinny?” Maura asked.

After an hour of fluffing branches [my arms hurt!]

And this is it, with almost all our ornaments up.

With flash you can see the ‘snow’.

I was fully prepared to not like the tree, but I’m actually very pleased with how it looks. Setup was easy. The most time-consuming part was opening up all the branches. That probably took me an hour. Oh, and putting up the star. Real trees have the thick trunk that the star sits on; this one, well the top kept drooping under the weight of the star, so I had to wrap a bunch of little branches around it to make it stay. The fact that it’s pre-lit is awesome. The “snow” made a bit of a mess during the setup process, but nothing that a vacuum couldn’t clean up.

The tree cost $250+ tax. My mom thought that was way too expensive, but it seemed on the low end compared to other brands. Maybe fake trees are just cheaper in Texas. Multiply how much we used to spend on a real tree times times 5, and it more than pays for itself. Anyway, I just saw that the price dropped to $196.71 with free shipping… sounds like a good deal to me, if you happen to be looking for a tree!

Speaking of deals – remember, I’m giving away a $50 gift card to the Home Depot that ends tonight at midnight!