Christmas tree and pets

[Gempress]

Inspired by all the Christmas tree threads in the Fire Hydrant, I thought I'd ask: How do you put up your Christmas tree?

Given the destructive tendencies of Horsemen tails, over-exhubrant kitties and overall mayhem, we have to raise our tree off the ground. We have a piece of MDF cut to fit the top of the ottoman. Every year, we set the MDF on top of the ottoman, then put our artificial tree on top. Then Hubby takes several rachet-strap tiedowns from his truck, runs them completely around the ottoman, tree stand and MDF, and straps the whole thing in place. It won't move for an earthquake. After I cover the bottom with some decorative Christmas fabric, it actually looks quite nice.

We still reserve the lowest part of the tree for the non-glass ornaments, though. Horsemen tails reach pretty far!

How do you put up your Christmas tree?

 

[Emmalee]

My tree only has ribbon and lights on it, no ornaments this year. Tavish hasn't realized the tree is there.. he seems kinda oblivious to it and thats good cause I was afraid he was going to take off with the ribbon and lights.. LOL

 

[nashnsegersmom]

Our family tradition is to put the tree in an antique sleigh....keeps the little kids and fur babies off the presents as we can put presents in the tree, and put Santa's gifts under the sleigh for morning joy!

 

[Southpaw]

We don't really have to worry about the animals and the tree. Molly really could not care less and barely even sniffs at it. Lucy is low enough to the ground she can't do much damage if she tried, lol.

The only one who causes problems is the cat, Jinx; many ornaments have been broken by him batting them off the tree and chasing them down the stairs, haha. We try to put the ornaments up high enough that he can't reach them, and yet still low enough that it doesn't look ridiculous. Overall though I guess he's not really that bad about it.

 

[Punkygirl0101]

Well, in our current house the cats would be IN the tree, and they would knock ornaments off..and tear open presents lol. (So I had that excuse when I was younger "The cat opened it"), but we are actually moving to a wonderful, new, huge house that is actually like two separate houses in a way..and the X mas tree will be in an animal free zone. (We are moving before christmas)

 

[Maxy24]

We always have a real tree, so it's in a stand and none of the animals take notice except for the occasional kitty swat at a low ornament. The dog didn't care at all and the kitties have never tried to climb it (yet).

 

[mrose_s]

we get a 20L bucket, jam it in and stack rock sall around it. Add a bit of water to keep it happy and wrap the bucket in wrapping paper.

 

[Barb04]

Since we have 4 dogs and 2 cats, I don't put up a big tree. We have a small 2' tree that I put up on a counter where the cats don't climb up. It's the thought, not the size that counts.

 

[milos_mommy]

Our family tradition is to put the tree in an antique sleigh....keeps the little kids and fur babies off the presents as we can put presents in the tree, and put Santa's gifts under the sleigh for morning joy!

that sounds really nice.

We just keep out ornaments off the bottom branches. This is only Milo's second christmas, but last year he was pretty good. Sometimes he seems to think Christmas orbs are tennis balls, but mostly he ignores it.


Benji's afraid of it.

 

[Lizmo]

I've never had problems with my dogs and the tree. The only time I've had a problem is when Lizzie has a present or two under there and she smells (say it came from Petsmart) it, then LOVES to wrip the paper off.

Thas only happend once though. They ver take any ornaments or candy canes off.

 

[Dreeza]

I think we've only had a tree (one of those big live ones) once since we've gotten Oakley, and we put it up like normal.

We had no clue how he'd react, but he was great about it!! He pretty much ignored it.

I think his tail may have accidentally swat an ornament like one time, no biggie!.

 

[Mindy Miller]

Our animals pretty much leave the tree alone. Alice (kitty) might bat at an ornament or two, but she gets bored quickly. sleeping is way more fun, duh.

We're the ones who break things...last year we got a real tree and it was too big for the tree stand we had. We came home to our christmas tree lying across the living room floor with many many heirloom ornaments broken