I had a true brainstorm last December when it came time to assemble my Christmas tree. I wanted to do something different, so I was walking around the house and shop, looking for inspiration, when I spied some dusty, cob-webby big-horn sheep skulls that we’d collected in Sterling City, TX.

“AHAHA!” I thought, quickly followed by, “Hmmm, how’m I gonna talk Reese into using his precious collection as Christmas decorations?” And this was followed by, “Eww! These things are really dirty; it’s gonna be alot of work to clean all this crap up so I can bring it inside without unleashing a bunch of insects in my house.”

By the end of the day, and after much dusting, cleaning, and de-bugging, here are the results; what I termed “the tree of skulls.”