The Saga of the Christmas Tree

Here's to you Mrs. Erickson...

So Mom requested, (yes, a while ago, as you can tell by the title), to know about the Christmas tree adventure.  An undertaking which Sienna tried hard to discourage.  But determination on my part won out, unable to be swayed by a three year old.  

The challenge: Get a Christmas tree from the woods, cut it down, load it on top of the car, and bring along two small children.  I may be invincible on my own, but add children to the mix and my defenses weaken.  

It was December 2nd or 3rd, I believe, and after not getting a tree the weekend after Thanksgiving or Monday night for FHE, I realized I needed to take action into my own hands.  The nights were cold and with it getting dark early, it was best to go get the tree in the middle of the day.  And that being the time when the men folk work, (aka Glen) I was left to get the tree by myself.

I was a little apprehensive as we (me, Sienna, and Liam) started off.  But as I said earlier, I was determined, so thus it began.

I loaded up the kids, the straps, snacks, (you always gotta bring those) and we were off.  The lucky thing is, that where we live, we are only a 10 minute or so drive from the national forest.  So that is the easy part.  Just a leisurely drive up the mountain.  

I wanted to find a tree close to the road and make sure I wasn't on private land. Two important criteria.  Close to the road so it was a bit easier to drag out.  And the other, of course, is a given.  

As I was driving, I kept asking Sienna what she thought of this tree or that tree as we drove.  She would pick the small trees, closer to her size, which probably wouldn't have been a bad idea.  

After driving for a bit, we spotted one, and pulled over to have a look.  Liam had fallen asleep by this time, so Sienna and I decided to get out and see what we thought of the tree. (Don't worry, it was close to the road) But to get to the tree, we had to go down in a little valley where there was a flowing creek and then up the other side where you could see the tree clearly from the car.  This took us a bit longer that expected because crossing water with a little one always takes longer, and then climbing up to the tree, we met with some rock like shale that kept sliding under foot. We finally made it though, only to discover that the beautiful tree we saw was much to large.  This always seems to be the case when choosing Christmas trees, with the sky as your ceiling.  At this point, Sienna suggested another smaller tree.  It was possibly only a foot taller than me, so I said no.  It would have probably have been a wise choice.  

Heading back to the car a bit defeated, my standards for the perfect tree slackened a bit.  Almost any tree would do.  And then there it was! A beautiful tree.  It had a funny branch part growing out.  But I convinced myself that this only added character.  I asked Sienna what she thought of this one.  She wanted to get back to the car and give up the excursion.  I agreed we should get back to the car.  So we'll take it.

It was a good thing I brought the bone saw.  Yes, the one for the elk and deer.  Superb teeth for the tree too.  Cutting with one of those is a cinch.  We had the tree down in less time than it takes to say "Yippy Ay Yeah." Well, almost.   And then we proceeded to drag it back to the truck.  (Car and truck are used interchangeably.  Car when you're driving in it.  Truck when you're getting ready to load it) With a little crazy maneuvering, we had the tree across the creek and back up the hill.  

Now for loading it.  This is where another person would have come in handy.  Preferably a person over 3.  

So after trying to lift the tree over my head like Hercules or maybe the Grinch when his heart was three sizes too big, I gave up that feat.  I problem solved to get on top the the Tahoe (yea, call it that too) instead and drag the tree up trunk side first.  And that is how you get a Christmas tree on top of a vehicle.  I was pretty proud and Sienna was too as you can see by the smile on her face in the following pictures. Liam was just happy to get out of his car seat.  

I then strapped the tree down (I think my strapping abilities could use a little work, since we had to pull over and readjust) and we headed home. 

We felt like Champions. (yes, I quoted the little engine that could "I think I can, I think I can" for Sienna) We did it!  Next Stop, climb Pikes Peak.  Well, someday.  But we were pretty happy.   

 Super excited Sienna here.  

"What's going on?"

  After we got the Christmas tree up, it looks beautiful, but I thought we should have been a bit more choosy.  Because it turns out, all that character caused the tree to be crooked.
                                                

 We had to put hooks in the wall, with fishing line to get it to stay up.  

Maybe real Christmas trees are beautiful to you, because of all the work it takes to get one.  Just like the food it better when you work to harvest it yourselves....I'll have to think on that one.