How to Recycle Christmas Trees

During Christmas dinner, my mom and I were reminiscing about how, back in my childhood, our family used to make the trip to pick out a Christmas tree from a lot. I especially remember the times this trip occurred in the dark. The lot would be lit up with a combination of Christmas lights and incandescent bulbs (no fluorescents, which are much less romantic) strung up in a makeshift, ramshackle manner. There was enough light to cast a cool golden glow over the Christmas trees, but not enough to eliminate all those shadows where elves lurk.

The whole experience was magical, but then again, I've always had an affinity for night scenes illuminated with soft lighting. For some reason, I'll remember such scenes for years, while I may forget daytime scenes which, at the time, seemed to hold greater significance. Go figure!

In our conversation, my mom recalled how she always used to have to light a fire under dad to undertake the trip to the Christmas tree lot. She said she would remind him that the sad day when the tree would have to come down would come sooner than we might think, so it behooved us to purchase and set up the tree well before Christmas.

What did we do with our Christmas trees after the holiday each year? Well, this was back in the days when, if you described yourself as "green," folks would think that you were a Martian in disguise! Nonetheless, we did, in fact, recycle our Christmas trees, although we didn't use the highfalutin term "recycling" to describe our practice. Avid bird-watchers, for us, sticking it outside afterwards to provide cover for the wild birds just seemed like the natural thing to do.

Read my article for more ideas for recycling Christmas trees.

Read article: How to Recycle Christmas trees

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