Light Conspiracy

I was planning on sharing some holiday decoration photos tonight, but unfortunately it seems that the Christmas lights are out to get me.  I set up my classroom tree last weekend, only to find midweek that one of the light strings burned out - in the middle of the tree!  Of course, being the perfectionist that I am, I HAVE to fix it.  Add lights to the shopping list - check.

Which brings me to tonight.  Even though I won't be here Christmas day, I decided that I couldn't forgo having a beautiful tree set up in the living room.  So, I began to set up our lovely, prelit, and much to my chagrin, artificial tree, by flaring out all the branches, making sure there are no gaps, etc.  Then I plug in the tree and what do I find - a section of the lights are out.  "No problem," I think to myself.  I bought an extra set of light in case this happened this year.  As I was putting on the new string of lights, half of them suddenly go out on my new string.  Seriously?!  You've got to be kidding me.  I was so frustrated that I just stopped and now my tree is only partially set up.  Now I need to get more lights for both trees.  Grrr...

Thankfully, I can find solace and Christmas tree beauty in other places.  Our church always has beautiful trees set up in the sanctuary.  Last night at a women's event I got to sit right by them and enjoy their glow.  The pictures just don't do it justice!

For those of you artificial-tree-experts, I have a question for you: do I take off the old lights that don't work and are intricately wound around each branch?  It bugs me that they are on there and don't work, but at the same time, I can't imagine trying to take them off.  It's quandary, I tell you....