Oh Christmas Tree!

When I was a kid in West Virginia, putting up the Christmas tree meant something very special. Well, putting it up was great, but actually finding one was a fantastic saga of epic proportions. See, we would NEVER be caught with an artificial tree and a soon-to-be-dead tree you actually paid for was even worse. No, that time honored holiday ritual meant one thing only - cut it off the neighbor's property.

We had to do that because dad's detestation of all things coniferous meant that most all of the pine trees on our 7 acre wooded spread had been eradicated so as to not "choke out the good trees, like the oaks and maples" dad would say. Plus, our friendly hermit neighbor Mr. Burns was happy to let us roam his 90+ acres in hopes of finding a suitable Christmas tree. And it usually took all 90 to find one. Although my older sister and I would take turns choosing the tree each year, I most always got to do the cutting and hauling, sometimes almost 1/2 a mile back to our house. I loved it. The prevalent evergreen in our neck of the woods was the one-sided-scrub-pine. It fit nicely against the wall and you were able to see EVERY ornament at the same time no matter where you stood in the room. We loved our Charlie Brown Christmas trees - so much so that sometimes we'd find two of them and wire them together to provide enough coverage and limbs for decorations.

Now that I'm a father and actually like evergreens, I decided that I'd start a similar tradition with our family (minus the trespassing and felling of scrub pines.) This past Saturday, we headed out to BIG LAKE TREES to find our perfect Christmas tree. After two years of buying 3 foot trees at the grocery store and putting them on the end table out of reach of our daughter's curious arms, we decided it's time for a mid-sized tree.

We all donned our raincoats as we hiked around the well tended tree farm of douglas, grand and noble firs, with spruce and pine interspersed. Evie enjoyed the hiking and texture of the wet evergreen needles.


We decided ahead of time that we'd know the right tree when we saw it. And we did.


A continuing tradition of carrying the tree...


And a surprising end to our experience. De-needling!


Christmas Tree De-Needling from Jennifer Bradbury on Vimeo.

With "A Charlie Brown Christmas" playing in the background, we hung our small collection of ornaments on our 5' 5" de-needled noble fir Christmas tree. Only 1 ornament was broken in the process - not bad for Evie's first go.


As a side note, we have a smaller artificial thrift store tree with lights in the playroom that Jen hung a few candy canes off of for decoration. Until Saturday, those candy canes were only colorful decorations in Evie's mind...but then she was given her first candy cane.

Sunday morning was peculiarly quite as Evie tends to wake us up with some stuffed animal or baby either kissing us or yelling "wake up" at us in a mock animal/baby voice. As I shuffled into the kitchen and living room to locate our morning child, I caught her red handed and red faced with a candy cane in each hand, standing next to the Christmas tree like Christmas morn. I had to smile.


She gladly posed for an incriminating photo and remarked, "my hands SO sticky!" Whether it's sap, candy canes, scotch tape or cookie dough, it's hard not to get a little sticky this season as we make those great memories together that will hopefully stick around even after the season's gone.

Happy Holidays.
Jimmy