“Instead of pine sap, I got some grease on myself,” he said, smiling and holding out his palm.
Ms. Tucci’s comeback was instant. “Artificial sap,” she joked.
States like Colorado that have lots of evergreens growing naturally out of the ground, and an outdoorsy culture of skiing and hiking among those trees, might not seem like the most likely of markets for fake.
But the idea of treeness, which is essentially what artificial Christmas tree companies offer — a manufactured tree symbolizing a real tree that in turn is loaded with symbolic meaning itself — sells pretty well here.
Artificial tree sales have been growing, on average, about 7.5 percent annually for the past five years, according to the American Christmas Tree Association, a trade group.
The company that sold the Tuccis their tree, Balsam Hill, said the best markets for artificial trees were in the East (Connecticut and Massachusetts tie for first, measured against population). Colorado and Washington State are tied for 11th place this season.
Amy Metzger, who lives south of Denver in the town of Castle Pines (yes, the real name), also got an artificial tree last week, from a company called Treetopia, which specializes in the nontraditional. Her tree looks full from the front but is trimmed and shaped in back so that it can tuck into a corner. The company also sells a gay-themed tree with a top-to-bottom rainbow and an upside-down tree that stands on its point.
“Our house here is surrounded by real trees, so it’s O.K. to have an artificial one,” said Ms. Metzger, 54, a surgical assistant.
For the Tuccis, who moved to Colorado from Michigan last year, the border-crossing from real to artificial — their tree cost $369 — was partly, if perhaps paradoxically, about holding on to the authentic elements of the holiday season.
They had done the bundle-up-and-tromp-through-the-snow routine for years at tree farms in Michigan with their son, Michael, 10, and daughter, Isabella, 3, but found that cut-your-own was harder to find in Colorado. Ms. Tucci, 41, also began to conclude that sap-sticky hands were overrated.
“I think I romanticized the real tree thing too much,” she said.
Mr. Tucci, 46, a nature artist, said he had been deeply affected by the devastation he had seen in Colorado’s lodgepole pine forests, where an infestation of beetles has killed millions of trees in recent years.
So the Tuccis made the leap away from nature with the idea that it might get them closer to the simplicities they loved, like decorating the tree with an assortment of mismatched family heirloom ornaments.
Is the new tree perfect?
Perhaps, but that can be overcome as well, Mr. Tucci said, ever the artist as he bent branches in adjustment.
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