Friday Frustrations

Well, you know when it comes to Christmas decorating, there are always frustrations. Usually it has to do with the tree(s). This year it was all about our new decorations---that we thought would be so quick and easy. Really? What were we thinking? Nothing is quick or easy!

The weekend before Thanksgiving, the weather was nice--warm and sunny. Butch and I decided to get the outside wreaths up and put the garland on the staircase. He started on the wreaths, I started on the garland.

Butch started in my office with all the boxes. What a mess! He had cleaned the upper porch the day before so that he wouldn't get my carpet all dirty coming in and out. We don't use that porch, so it was pretty dirty.

I ended up helping him. He did not want to do the "fluffing"--which is necessary to take the wreaths from their "boxed" 24" to their full glory of 36"! He held them while I  tied the wreaths on.  They are beautiful with their red and gold ornaments and big red bows.

It's hard to get a good nighttime picture. These prelit wreaths were definitely the way to go this year. So, "his" wreaths were not that frustrating--everything went off without a hitch.

It was "my" garland that was frustrating. Let's start with getting it out of the box. There were 8 of those zip tie thingies (you know, the kind kidnappers use) holding the garland in the box. I started with regular scissors, but they couldn't cut through them. I had to stop and go get the heavy duty, Cutco scissors that can cut pennies. I've never needed them to cut pennies, but I certainly needed them to cut through those zip ties. They did the job--like cutting through butta'!

Let's begin with stretching out 9ft.'s worth. And then the fluffing--never fun. So much fluffing and then more fluffing.

Then there's all the aggravating attachments which require more scissor work.

When it's all said and done, this is the detritus from just ONE garland! Sheesh!

I started at the top. The garland is heavy, so it was tricky to hold it, wrap the wire and twist in place. When I got to the second piece, can you see what happened? The lights did not work!! Are you kidding me? After all that fluffing?? OMGosh!

So, I went on to the third strand and finished this part of the rail. The next day, I went back to Sam's and exchanged the defective one for another. Good thing I went then. ALL the decorations were gone!!! Gone! All of those big outdoor decorations too--gone! All that was left were 4 boxes of this garland. I guess not many people wanted the silver and gold! Okay by me. I was happy to be able to replace it. Putting on the last strand went off without a hitch.

This is what it looks like at night. So pretty. It already came with silver and gold ornaments and bows, so there was no decorating involved. Not exactly easy peasy, but certainly more timesaving. 

Aside from the aggravations, we are really happy with our purchases this year. Now our recent frustrations with the delivery of the new refrigerator to the beach condo is another story. I'm not even going in to it because it's too long of a story. Let's just say, from about noon to 3:30 p.m. on Wedensday, it was constant stress and frustration. Butch and I were both so worked up that we were snipping at each other. I guess if we were going to have a stroke, it would have been during that 3 hour span. Oh, and it's not over yet. After the delivery, the d**n thing doesn't work. We get to go through it all over again on Monday!! It's hard to remodel long distance for sure!