Ask Lemmy

Real Christmas tree, fresh from a farm about 2km from here.

Used to throw a Christmas tree festival. We have artificials we got from that.

I'd be fine with a fake one, but my wife prefers real ones, so that's what we do.

Fake

Of course only the real thing counts. It's a superstition after all, isn't it?

Artificial, bought a friend's tree second hand 8 years ago.

Thinking about replacing it next year. Have a toddler, and trying to make Christmas more special, and this one's old enough it's lots a lot of it's needles

Real tree

I don't really want to do a tree to begin with but if my wife's gonna make me do it I'm going to do it right.

Also I don't have to wrestle the damn thing up and down the rickety ladder to my attic, it's bad enough that I have to do that with the bins of ornaments.

And I get the catharsis of getting to burn the damn thing after the season is over.

Also it gives my house a slight piney scent.

Artificial for sure. That's been the case since 2 years before kids were born.

I never had an artificial tree growing up. We always cut it ourselves, drilled it, fed it, decorated it and so on. I took my wife from the city to go cut one and it was a great experience. That said, the artificial one is so nice. It gets assembled and has lights included, so once you stack it, it turns on and is already lit. All you have to do is arrange ornaments.

Full disclosure, I HATE DECORATING A TREE. So for me, not having to put lights on is a huge win. Also it's the right height every time, And stuff just works.

We’ve been living in small apartments. We got one of the pencil trees from Balsam Hill around 2009-2010 and still use it. Works way better in tight corners than a natural tree.

We swap back-and-forth between real and fake. Some of it depends upon time to be able to go out and get one, because we go and chop ours down When we get a real one. It also depends on the weather if it gets really cold sometimes will just put up the fake one. But yeah, we do prefer a real one.

Big artificial one, and one tiny "sad" real tree.

This stems from three years ago when we had to say goodbye to our 12 year old dog that we had since he was a puppy. We had zero desire to put up our artificial tree, but we wanted something so we grabbed the last 3" tree from whole foods that had fallen behind the display. We only put on one Star Trek DS9 Worf ornament and a small strand of lights.

Over the years it's become our Star Trek tree, but we still try to find the saddest tree of the lot.

@butterycroissant one of my imfant memories is going to woods somewhere so my mum could steal the christmas tree, its a good memorie :)

nowadays its artificial for sure, i am to pussy to steal things

Fake tree. Easier, safer, less messy. Yeah, it's plastic, but it lasts as long as you want to keep using it. We just got a new one because we needed a skinny one for space reasons. But the old one we had for over a decade, and we sold it on to someone else.

Artificial mainly because we spent a fortune on a good one like 10 years ago but I don’t have to shell out $150 for a new one each year. Plus it’s pre-lit.

We buy a live tree, but a small one.

Still deciding.

• I have fond childhood memories of traipsing through a tree farm until we found the right one, then taking turns using the old two handled buck saw we carried out, then trying to work as a team to carrry a massive tree back
• now I live in an urban area with no nearby tree farm. I’m sticking spending well over $100 and I don’t have a car with roof rack to carry it.

Sometimes I use an artificial tree and sometimes I goto Home Depot as the most reasonably priced place to get a real one. Last year the selection at Home Depot was bad plus they were all small so I spent twice as much at a higher end place

Neither of them

I use a real tree because I have cats that would eat the plastic one, and I feel that plastic trees are worse for the environment.

I use an artificial, don't see the point of cutting down a whole tree for it to slowly die in your house over a month to then throw it out after.

If there were more services where you could rent the tree and then it gets put back in the ground after the season I would be all for it.

Artificial trees you buy once and you don't need to replace it for years if not decades. Though would prefer if they started making them with biodegradable plastic

I can't put a full sized tree up no matter what because of a bad kitty.

I used to put a fake one up so I didn't have dropped needles and when it gets dry it is a huge fire hazard.

Artificial. Real trees are a colossal pain in the ass.

No

We get a real one from our neighbor, he does yardwork & sod most of the year but at Christmas he gets some trees to sell from some guy he knows in N Carolina and they are always amazing all of them. Yes it costs a lot, we have a large family who come for Christmas and it's nice, I categorize the expense as entertaining.

When I was poor, I would just make a "tree" each year out of something. One year the coat rack, one year on the wall in construction paper, one year I found a inflatable one like a beach ball, one year my ex cut the top off a bush & hedged it into a cone - that went on for almost 20 years, always something different. My kids didn't mind at all, nobody ever said "you need a tree" only "cool". You don't need a tree. Don't feel obligated at all.

At work I have a wee artificial one.

Plastic.

Y'all put up trees every year?

My family bought a miniature real one two years ago so we'll probably keep using it. It's a bit of a hassle to water and take care of throughout the year, but I like it, the water is probably still cheaper than buying a whole new tree, real or artificial. It looks cute and is (obviously) easy to decorate.

My wife’s allergic to pretty much everything, including pine needles, so we bought a high end artificial one years back. Looks like the real deal and doesn’t leave her in massive discomfort.

Artificial, real trees are not easily available where I live. Plus we get the same tree every year!

I just hire someone to stand in the corner after I cover them in lights.

Real. I can't stand fake things, especially fake nature. Wood veneers, marble painted plaster laminates, LVT, no no no. I'd sooner have no tree at all.

We did real ones for years, but in our new house I got tired of sweeping pine needles, and still finding some in April.

Also, we adopted two inquisitive cats, and the tree water is highly toxic. So these days, it's artificial, downstairs and upstairs.