The orderly disposal of Christmas Trees

I thought you would be interested to know how Christmas Trees are "put to rest"/ disposed of here in Germany. Real Christmas Trees of course. Unlike our sweet, pre-packaged, pre-lit, PX special right here:

Here in Germany, each neighborhood has a designated Christmas Tree Disposal-Pick-Up-Point. Ours happens to be right across the street from our house. I have a good view of it from my office window.

In good, orderly German fashion, the locals have been depositing their Christmas Trees at the designated disposal spot. I have been working at home this week on my business, and so I have watched the process unfold during this week. It is especially cute to see dads come along with their small kids to drop off the trees, and to see the kids try to help dad pull the tree from their car and onto the pile. All stacked very neatly, of course ;-)

You can barely see the temporary sign indicating the disposal area, above. You can also see our house over the tops of the Christmas Trees. I love the smell of a real Christmas Tree fir, however you've got to admit, that the convenience and easy-clean-up-ability of the (ok I'll say- faux) American Christmas Tree has its place. I'm sure one day again in the future we will get a "real" Christmas Tree again, maybe when we have kids, but for now our little special works just fine. Our friend Romain (Adele's husband) just kept staring at our tree when they came over for New Year's Eve. After about an hour he said:

" I would like to buy your tree."

"Oh Romain, thank you for complimenting my tree, but you can easily get a Christmas Tree here."

"No really, I would like to buy your tree when you go back to the United States."

"But this tree is special to us."

"You can keep the decorations then."

I think he likes the way it packs up neatly in a box. Just so:

On another note, I "surprised" Zev by shoveling the driveway AND salting it this morning. It is snowing buckets (I'm not sure if you can say "it's snowing cats and dogs") but it is snowing constantly right now. Well, I think this is a lot of snow. As Zev says whenever I make a comment like this "oh this is nothin'. You should see the snow in upstate New York". Anyway, Zev usually does the shoveling and salting/ de-icing of the driveway. I have offered to do it numerous times, but he likes to do it. So this morning, I went out with my snow shovel and salt bucket and went to work.

Gotta begin by shoveling out your walking areas....

Heinz from next door even came out for a chat. I like chatting with Heinz because he is not afraid to correct my German. Which is a good way to learn German.

Hope you are all having a good start to 2010! This is going to be a good year. I just feel it in my bones.

Love and hugs, Fi