The Tree is Finally Up (Just in time for Hanukkah)
To get the formalities out of the way, yes, I'm Jewish. But, Michael isn't, so we celebrate both Christmas AND Hanukkah in our house. The kids really do love lighting the menorah and getting 8 presents, but the Christmas tree and all of the ceremony surrounding it really do steal the show.
When we lived in Toledo, we used to drive about 40 minutes to a tree farm south of the city. There, we'd trek through the trees, find one to our liking, and have one of the nice boys working there cut it down for us. We always went with white pine. I loved the silvery, long needles, and the fact that it isn't highly allergenic (Michael is a sneezer).
So, this year, now that we have a house again (last year we had our small apartment, so just got a little artificial guy from Target), I decided that it would be a really great idea to find a Christmas tree farm and cut down a white pine. I found a great place about 75 miles outside of the city with organic trees. Of course, the weekend I decided to do this (last weekend), was one of the rare weekends that Michael didn't come home. And then we had a snow storm.
Now, I'm known for biting off more than I can chew, but I am slowly learning when to cry uncle, and that's what I did this weekend. I canceled the trip to the tree farm, and decided to just walk over to Dylie's school for a pre-cut tree. I figured I'd even get bonus mom points for the $10 that gets donated to her school for each tree purchased.
So, late Saturday afternoon, Dyl and I trekked through the snow to her school to pick out a tree. We found a lovely Frasier Fir (the only variety they had, but it's really nice), and asked them to deliver it. And then I asked if they could drill a hole in the bottom of the tree for me. You see, we have the kind of tree stand that requires a hole in your tree. It's like the one on this page. The guy looked at me like I was nuts and told me to just do it myself at home. With a hammer.
An hour later, our tree was brought to the house by a guy with a chunk of chewing tobacco in his mouth the size of a golf ball. He placed the tree on my floor and left. It was covered in snow and ice. So, first I tried jamming the tree stand onto the tree with a hammer, which was completely unproductive. I then headed downstairs for the drill. And, at that point, I really wished that Jeanne was over. I tried texting Michael for some drill instructions, but he was MIA, so I was left to my own devices. Once I figured out which were the drill bits and which were the screwdriver bits, I was all set. I charged up the drill, and drilled a huge hole in the tree trunk. And then I put up the tree!!
I had to let it dry out overnight with four beach towels underneath to catch the drips. We decorated the tree Sunday night while listening to Hipsters' Holiday and Dean Martin. It was a ton of fun to see all of our ornaments again (they were in storage last year), and the tree looks great.
I have all of our tree (and menorah!) pictures up here.
Tonight I'm having a giant party at my house for all of the ladies from the Chicago Moms Blog. It is being sponsored by Graco, and should be a blast, complete with catered food, manicures and lots of booze.
I'll try to check in tomorrow with pics from the event.
