Aphids. More precisely, conifer aphids.

Not ticks. Ticks have 8 legs; aphids have 6.

Thank you so much! I needed another person(s) to convince her. Hopefully a lot more people respond which will help me even more. :) Thanks again!

I have to say that those thing are terribly ugly and scary to even look at. You pooor thing!
They don't look like ticks to me though. My friend who studies ticks says they are nothing like them, nor do they congregate like that ...You can breathe a sigh of relieve.
Ticks scare me. I have been attacked by one before.
Ticks can be nasty to look at, and nasty to the body if even one gets on you when you are not aware of it!
Aphids are sweet in comparison..:-)

Agreed, conifer aphids - hopefully she will calm down.

Although I can understand why finding them would make her uncomfortable, who intentionally brings that stuff indoors other than at Christmastime :) And I was annoyed (always) at the spider or two that seems to come in annually on my own tree, even with hosing it down outside first. This year I hunted one for about 6 days before dispatching it from my ceiling, but not before it had happily spun webs from bookshelf to tree, tree to lamp shade, shade to lamp table, tree to ceiling....Little black and white spider on my light colored ceiling was its downfall.

Here is a link that might be useful:

It's something of a 'tradition' to bring a praying mantid egg case or two inside with the Xmas tree, only to have them hatch out after several days of toasty temperatures. I'd rather have them than spiders or aphids, though.