Back to Fake Trees, Advent 2009

Looking ahead to Advent 2009, we thought, "last year we went away from the Christmas tree look, let's go back".  And yes 17 fake Christmas trees by my count existed in our storage closet.  I put out a church wide, week long Christmas tree assembly/decorating event the week of Thanksgiving for anybody and everybody to come in and put up some trees.  Oddly enough, the youth group ended up putting 90% of these together (thanks Tom Greenwald/Youth Director at the time).  We also had these "gobos" they call them, to put in some of our can lights that project shapes of light on the walls, ie wise men and angel.  So back to the Macy's look I guess, for this year.  we made an executive decision never to do that many Christmas trees again - way too stressful to find the help :(

Also note we covered our spandex star with gold fabric to make it more "kingly", and we spent a good hour putting a wooden cross somewhat perfectly in the shadow of the star.  The cross was pointed out on Christmas Eve how the birth of Christ would foreshadow the cross.  (P.S. many people thought that was coincidence :)  Then of course the manger surrounded by poinsettias on the steps of the stage.  Oh and the little benches over to stage right were used every week (including Christmas Eve) for a children's message.  Not sure where all those benches ended up...