christmas tree-mergency

So, the Grinch almost stole Christmas this year... want to hear the story of how?

jerk

It was the little jerk in the above photo, plus a whole lot of his friends.  PJ and his mom arrived home yesterday to find the little buggers (literally) marching out of their home inside their Christmas tree and out across the floor!
Wait... WHAT?!  Bugs in the Christmas Tree?!
Unfortunately, yes.
I got this information in a storm of text messages as I emerged from the subway yesterday evening leaving work.  PJ had taken control of the situation, they were taking down the tree, cleaning up the bugs, and bringing the tree back to where they got it.  TWO DAYS BEFORE CHRISTMAS.

What a huge bummer.  What was the plan?  Did they want another real tree, possibly also full of bugs?  Could we find an artificial tree replacement?  What about the rest of the Christmas To-Do list?

To make a probably-too-long-when-I-retell-it story short... we all sprang into action!  My family headed over to PJs to help with the tree, and I started calling stores to inquire about artificial trees.  Since no, you cannot find an artificial tree in-stock 2 days before Christmas in any store, PJ swapped the bug tree for a new tree that had been outside on some below freezing nights (which should have killed off any traces of bugs) and everyone pitched in to redecorate the tree and its surroundings, as well as make a bazillion cookies!

tree 2.0

Christmas was saved!  I love my family *both families* SO MUCH!
Hopefully from here on out, things will be totally uneventful... please, Santa?

<3 Barb

PS- we weren't the only ones with a tree-mergency!  Check out Meggie's story here.  Hopefully everyone else's holidays have been much less crazy.