What to do when your beautiful Christmas tree is crawling with spiders

A week and a half ago, Daniel and I brought home the biggest Christmas tree I have ever had. It's about 10 feet tall and almost grazes our vaulted ceiling. It was quite the adventure getting it up three flights of stairs, but other than that things went smoothly and we've been loving our big beautiful tree.

That was, until Monday morning when I came out and found about seven spiders on the ceiling. I walked into the kitchen, there's three more. Oh, there's another one in the living room. Spiders. Everywhere.



So naturally, I thought I'd share these oh so practical steps for what to do when your beautiful Christmas tree is crawling with spiders.

1. Try to carry on with your normal routine, but quickly discover you can't relax in a room full of enemies.

2. Panic.

3. Ask your husband to help and watch him run around the house batting a broom at the ceiling. 

4. Tell all of your coworkers and text all your friends.

5. Spend the entire work day imagining there will be 70 spiders on the ceiling when you return home.

6. Briefly consider getting rid of your Christmas tree, but you spent $40 on it and it would ruin the holiday magic.

7. Google solutions and find absolutely insane advice.

8. Go home to only 5 spiders and feel relieved. Spend the evening repeatedly knocking down the bridge the spiders are building from the star to the ceiling.

9. Keep track of the travel of each spider. You might as well have them tagged like study animals, you know exactly where they've been and where they're going. 

10. Try to rationalize the situation. "It was their tree before it was mine." "They aren't out to get me." "They'll probably die soon." It won't work. 

11. Make sense of the situation through profound metaphors.  "The tree is us." "The tree is society". "The tree is the public education system". "The tree is the Christmas spirit and the spiders are consumerism, ruining it".

12. Negotiate with the spiders before going to bed. Have a talk with them that goes something like, "Look, we both know you're going to die soon, so it would be best if you stay in the tree, where you belong, and enjoy your last days in your natural habitat". 

13. Wake up in the morning to find just one spider on top of the star, claiming the tree as his own.

14. Eventually come to terms with them and say "hey" when you come into the room (you mostly talk to them because it makes you feel less intimidated).  

15. Continue to wearily look at the top of the star every time you pass the tree, but decide to not let it completely ruin your life. You did bring a live tree into your home after all, and you can't forget that nice pine scent!