Frequently heard phrases in my house in December: “Mmmm, gingerbread!” “Alexa, play Christmas music.” “Has anybody watered the tree lately?”
The last one gets answered when the needles start to fall off, and I worry about fire hazards.
Meet Evergreen Elf, a simple but super handy friend. He sits in the tree stand and lets you know when it’s getting low.
When your water level is good, the tree on his tummy lights up green. When it gets too low, it turns red. But if you can’t see him under your hefty tree and presents, there’s also an audio warning.
I was a little concerned about the elf’s “fun audio alert.” What does it sound like? How often does it go off? I work from home. The elf and I could get to be enemies.
Turns out, it’s pretty inoffensive. When the tree gets low on water, here’s what he says:
Most importantly, he says it those two times and then shuts up. Of course, there’s a chance you’re not in the room when his alert goes off. He does tell you again, but not immediately. The elf-informing interval is long enough that it will remind me again, but not so frequent that I’ll want to turn him off and send him back to the North Pole for toy assembly line duty.
I was also concerned about him fitting in our super-thick tree stand, but he worked just fine.
I’m pretty happy about a holiday season with less worry about a dry, dead tree. Now if only I could find that tree-watering boot-and-tube ornament my mom had back in the ’80s so I don’t have to climb under it!
GeekMom received this item for review.
Without testing the Elf, I would be curious how long it’ll last due to corrosion of the wires going in the water. It’s been shown by some soil moisture sensors that, if not built properly, the electrodes corrode due to the electrochemical activity, so they recommend soil sensors only be in soil when it’s time for moisture testing. It’ll be fun to hack this elf so it is on a motorized platform and dipped in a couple times a day. Regardless, it’s a clever product.