Christmas...childhood...the two are inexorably linked, aren't they? Even when the memories are...painful. Like the year I decided (with a certain amount of parental coercion) to make an extremely large kissing bough...the k.b. being (according to the great God Wikipedia):

"...a traditional Christmas decoration in England. Also called a Christmas-bough or mistletoe-bough, it has the shape of a sphere or globe with a frame made of wire. The whole frame is covered with greenery. Red apples or oranges may be hung from ribbons in the centre and mistletoe is tied below."

So...little Heb...a quantity of heavy-duty wire which she fashioned into a ball about a foot in diameter...buckets of holly (incredibly painful to attach, via thin wire, onto the ball)...and the final coup de grace...attached a couple of finger-pricking days later, I might add...the poesy of mistletoe hanging below.

It looked...if I might say in a slightly Martha Stewart-esque manner...rather impressive...festive, yet daunting by the sheer number of man (I mean chid) hours that it took to create. So imagine my chagrin when I saw the "Fresh Eucalyptus & Pomegranate Kissing Ball" available at Restoration Hardware for a mere $39...all the beauty, none of those pesky child labor laws.