Music, nostalgia, and Christmas. What more could a Christmas movie want? Oh, right, romance.

Alicia Witt plays Meg, the daughter of a family-owned music store on Christmas Tree Lane. Sadly, all of the stores on the lane are being pushed out to make room for office buildings. Meg brings all of the merchants together to try to save their stores.

Christmas Tree Lane is a little odd for a Hallmark Christmas movie. (I think they are sticking all of their unusual movies over on the Movies & Mysteries channel.) You could literally remove Nate (Andrew Walker), the love interest, and there would be very little impact on the story. I found it quite refreshing. It was nice that the movie focused on the history of the lane and the merchants trying to save their livelihoods.

I also liked that the movie featured musicians that still enjoy what they do. Meg had a little difficulty with her songwriting but I think it was more of a writer’s block type of thing than a losing passion for it thing. She still loved teaching music and convincing her student, Kari (Malaika Guttoh), to perform at the Christmas Eve concert. Meg even performed a song she wrote!

This was such a sweet movie. I would have liked to have a little more nostalgia in it…maybe a few scenes showing what the area was like 100 years ago instead of just talking about it…but not having that doesn’t ruin anything. And Alicia Witt is such a great actress, I think I would recommend any of her work. In short, this is definitely worth watching.