It has been our family tradition of going to a Christmas tree farm and cutting down our own selected Christmas tree since the first year Jay and I were married 43 years ago.
Both of our families had artificial Christmas trees growing up (although my family may have had a few real trees growing up, my memory has faded) and I guess we both liked the idea of starting our own family tradition of a real pine tree.
Each year we would go to a tree farm, walk around the lot full of trees and choose the “perfect” Christmas tree that would hold all of our ornaments. Some years we got taller, fuller trees that sat on the floor and nearly touched the ceiling, other years we would get a shorter fatter tree that would sit on top of our coffee table. The size of the tree would also often reflect how good or bad of a financial year we were having, so every so often we would have a smaller than usual tree.
There were a few years when the tree farms would sell out early and we would have to send Jay to the local tree lots in town in front of some hardware store or flower shop to bring home an already cut tree, and I will admit those trees never seemed quite as special as the ones we picked out as a family and cut down ourselves. By "ourselves" I mean Jay laying on the ground sawing down the tree, but we were there cheering his efforts on.
There was one Christmas that we just used one of the many artificial trees that I have around the house for decorations as our main Christmas tree. It was the first Christmas after we lost our daughter Torri to cancer. We just didn’t have the heart that year to go hunting for a real tree. It was the saddest Christmas ever and the tree reflected that grief. We still miss her terribly, but in her memory we have worked hard to bring back the joys of her favorite holiday.
The weather is usually horrible on the day we pick to go tree shopping. It’s either snowing or blowing, freezing cold, or all three, but not this year. This year there was no snow on the ground and the temps were mild and getting warmer each day.
Most years when I walk around the tree farm, I have this uncanny knack for tripping over the little tree stumps left by other trees that were cut down, or tripping over a dirt clod in the path. My fall is usually very slow and apparently hilarious to my children because it is always followed by me bouncing on the ground and all of them breaking into laughter. It has almost become as much of a family tradition as cutting down the tree.
We had to switch the tree farm we were first going to go to this year as they had closed already, no more trees left. We didn’t have everyone with us either, it’s hard to do now days with some living out of state and then there is the whole “whose weekend is it to have the kids” thing that seems to haunt our family.
Our youngest daughter Brittney and her two children were going to go with us, son Josh wasn’t able to and son Jason is in Missouri. I piled in the van with my daughter and kids and Jay drove his truck to use to haul our tree home. Off we went! We had a minor stop to coordinate the GPS’s and make sure we were indeed on the correct road, that confirmed, we continued on our quest for the perfect Christmas tree.
We got to the tree farm about an hour before they were to close. It was a cold clear late afternoon and we parked the vehicles at the sales shed and started walking down the dirt road and onto the paths in search of the “perfect” tree. Each of us pointing out the good qualities of this tree or that tree, but each tree falling just short of the perfect tree. We walked on and on going further and further back into the tree farm.
I carefully stepped over each little tree stump and focused on not falling down this year. We made it all the way to the back where the trees ended that were for sale. We had been told we could cut down any tree bearing a white tag on it, not any with bright pink reserved tags on them, nothing was said about no tag but we assumed those were the little ones that were not ready to go.
As we turned and headed back we noticed this beautiful almost 7 foot tall tree standing there like a shining beacon. It was almost perfectly rounded, no big bald spots, no wonky tree top – was this the perfect tree! My grandson ran up to it and declared it so and we all agreed! We had found the perfect tree!
We looked all over the tree to spot the white tag showing it was one of the trees for sale and was not a reserved tree. It was standing next to several others it’s height, although each were a bit flawed, but we could not find any white tag on it. There was no reserved tags either and nothing on the tree at all that said not to cut it. The tree had no tags that we could find.
Now we were faced with a real dilemma! We had found the perfect tree but there was no white tag on it. Being the critical thinkers that we are, we solved the problem by carefully removing the white tag from the tall tree next to it, so that we would be paying the correct price for the tree as they charge by the height of it, and placed it ever so carefully on our tree, the perfect tree. Problem solved.
Jay crawled under the tree and sawed it off and then hefted it over his shoulder, the tree saw in the other hand and we marched our way back down the path to the tree shed to pay for our perfect tree. We were singing praises to our tree along the way and the grand-kids were giddy with excitement to go home and decorate such a wonderful tree.
Tree paid for, hot chocolates all around, petting of the big yellow lab that was laying in the shed by the fireplace done. Time to get back into the vehicles and drive home and decorate the tree and cut out sugar cookies.
Jay had to make a stop in town first on his way home. The tree was laying in the back of his pickup and we were nervous some villain would snatch our perfect tree out of his truck while he was in the store, but I’m here to report both made it home safely.
I must say that our little bit of “larceny” has not taken away from the beauty and pleasure of this years Christmas tree at all! It stands tall and gracious in the living room, the ornaments hung and then re-hung after the grand-kids left (my OCD working overtime). It is another beautiful tree in a long line of traditional trees at our family
Christmas. Our dream has always been to buy a live tree that we could then plant on our farm after Christmas, but so far our dream of owning our own place is yet to be realized. Maybe someday. For now, I am enjoying the perfect tree.
Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Joyous Kwanza, Happy Holidays to you and yours!
Until next time…
Toni