You live in a gorgeous area. Hills! Extinct volcanoes! That is so cool.

When I put up a tree with cats, I had all sorts of non-breakables for the lower branches- wood, and cloth and plastic, mostly. In the evening I'd gather up all the things they'd knocked off, and put them in a basket near the tree. If I was feeling ambitious I'd rehang them, but mostly I just let the lower branches evolve to bareness.