If Real Isn't an Option: Our 5 Favorite Artificial Christmas Trees

Irwin Weiner ASID - It's a blessing to support Christmas tree farmers this time of year. If you live in a part of the world outside big cities where there are local tree farms, please support them; they plant a sustainable crop and deserve to make a good living, as do we all - and there's nothing like the smell of a fresh-cut tree in the home, using the proper watering and safety precautions, of course. 

But for the many of us who live in large cities, it's increasingly dubious (I think) to support the habit of transporting cut trees into the city, and you're not buying something really fresh when you get around to making the purchase. (And they're very overpriced.)

For the past ten years, we've had a Martha Stewart Christmas Tree from K-mart, and although we feel guilty that it's a vision of plastic and petroleum-based products instead of a real farmed tree, it's held up very well and we've saved time and money over the longrun - and this tree will last for eons.

Today's featured Young House Love video shows the decorating of a Christmas tree that's exactly like ours (although ours is a bit taller). And the photos in this post show some of our favorite alternative (read: fake) Christmas trees, if that happens to be your thing. Click on each photo for more product information.

I'd love to know what your family does for a tree around the holidays; add a comment to this post and tell me how you stand in the Real vs. Fake Tree issue. Thanks, and I hope you're having a fun season!

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Young House Love Celebrates the DIY Life (and Halloween)

Irwin Weiner ASID - It's really wonderful to see the variety of interior design and decorating blogs online! You can find snarky, funny takes on design, inspirational posts from top designers, and amateur "I love to decorate!" folks who blog about the evolution of their home building or remodeling or decorating. Young House Love is a great blog, and if you haven't seen it, click on the link and experience it now. Sherry and John Petersik share their DIY adventures in Richmond, VA, turning a ranch home from bland to hip, fab, West Elm-y cool.

They shop at Michaels and Target and other stores, and they get inspiration from home decor gurus like Martha Stewart (just like the rest of us). And they put out some fun videos, like today's featured duo of vids where they share some original Halloween decorating ideas, tricking out their home in black and white, and then paint pumpkins in a very artistic and creepy-crawlie way. Click here to learn more about their new book, too: Young House Love book.

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