Christmas has arrived,well nearly - Originally posted 23/12/05

Well I finally put up our tree so Santa has somewhere to leave the pressies. I thought I would quickly put it up while the girls were at their dads but it didn't turn out to be quite that easy.
First of all I had to get it down from the loft. I'm not the best person at climbing, I placed the ladder at the top of the stairs, where the hatch for the loft happens to be, and started to climb it. I got to the top and opened the hatch and all was in darkness, I had forgotten the plug for the loft light was in the cupboard I had just placed the ladder in front of. Back down the ladder I went, moved it out of the way and found the plug and plugged it in. I went back up the ladder, which by now I was a little shaky on, and opened the hatch again. Now the light was on I could see all the cob webs which were attached to the hatch.

Visions of massive black spiders on the other side of the hatch filled my head. Should I just give up now? I know Amy would be really disappointed if I did, or should I wait for Lou to come home so she could face the killer spiders? No, I decided I could do it with a little mind over matter thinking and by telling myself that I was a grown woman and after all I was a lot bigger than any spider I should happen to come across up there.

I lifted the hatch to one side and poked my head into the loft space. I could see the Christmas tree, where Lou had placed it when I made her put it up there last January. Seeing the tree was the easy bit, being able to reach it was a bit more difficult. Lou has longer legs than me and is able to get right up into the loft, but my legs aren't long enough to get me from the top of the ladder to the edge of the hatch. I looked around the loft to see if there was anything within reach that I could use as a type of fishing rod which would act as a hook to drag the tree to the hatch.

I found a long length of wood, which used to be one of the side rails on the girls bunk beds. I managed to pick the wood up and then I started to poke at the box which the tree was in. The box moved about 2 inches and then got stuck on another box which was full of 'things from the past' which should have been thrown away years ago but me being me, I could never quite bring myself to do it. Moving the 'past things' box out of the was I could see there was a section of the tree percariously clinging to the edge of the box by only one of its branches. One wrong move and it would fall. Well you guessed it, I dragged the box a few more inches and out it fell. Now not only did I have to get the box to the hatch but also the section of the tree which had fallen out. After about 30 minutes I managed to pull the box to the opening. Then after another 45 minutes the other piece was next to the box, now all I had to do was get it all out of the opening, down the ladder and into the sitting room.

I took the piece that had escaped the box and throw it down to the ground, that bit was easy. What was more difficult was getting the box through the opening and down the ladder while not falling off myself. I balanced the box on one hand and held on tight to the ladder with my other hand as I started to climb back down. It's surprising how heavy a Christmas tree can be when you are up a ladder, trying not to drop the box, while also trying to climb down. After a few frightening moments when I thought me and the tree were going to end up at the bottom of the stairs, I had done it. We were safe.

By the time the girls had returned from their dads the tree had been decorated. Lou didn't even notice it and all Amy said was 'oh the trees up'
Ummmm next year I don't think I will bother.