if Charlie Brown lived on a Caribbean island...

...this would be his Christmas tree.

Folks, that's a Christmas Palm! No lie! The name is derived from the scarlet berries it bears. Here's a large one outside our apartment in full bloom:

The evolution of this year's Christmas tree purchase went like this: Live trees are available on island, but they are expensive - $30 for small trees and $50 for full size. Also, you take the chance of all the needles dropping off the tree before Christmas if the weather is hot and sticky (which, incidentally, it hasn't been for the past few weeks. But how was I to know?) The other option is a fake tree, which, despite cute decorating possibilities, I couldn't bring myself to accept.  So I decided to search for a little palm tree that I can live with all year-round and decorate every Christmas.

I found our treasure at Every Bloomin' Thing - simply the best garden centre/florist/gift shop on island. I went over a lunch break and wished I had more than an hour to browse the many gorgeous trees, flowers, seeds, and decorations. A very friendly woman named Dee showed me around and advised me on indoor/outdoor trees (since I am totally a novice and have had one or two instances of bad luck with green things in the past.) I fell in love with my Christmas palm due to its size, shape, and price - with the 15% off Root Sale (every second Wednesday of every month), it was under $19! I picked it up the following Saturday and brought it indoors this week.

After the tree purchase, I still had to wrestle with my decorating options. Lights are a must; I settled on a short string of 20 white lights for the trunk and a string of 100 green lights for the leaves. I think all my lights cost about $5.

Finally, I needed ornaments (or, as the UKers say, "baubles".) Sticking with the non-traditional scheme, I went to Markson's Furniture (which yielded a lot more than furniture) and bought more shells, starfish, and sand dollars than my tree could handle - all for under $20. I picked up two cans of spray paint at a local hardware store, some Gorilla glue at Cost-U-Less, a spool of ribbon at the grocery store, and started my homemade ornament collection.

To be honest, the ornaments were a whole lot more glittery in my head than in real life. Maybe next year I'll add some sparkles to give my collection some bling.  For now, I'm just glad there's something green in the corner of our living room.

Oh, and in case you couldn't tell: Yes, that is a beach towel posing as a tree skirt. When in Rome, man...

Merry Christmas! Be jolly, no matter where you live!