the perfect tree, part 1

Yesterday was the day I had been waiting for with great anticipation: it was Christmas tree day.

My husband awoke to find his beaming pregnant wife excitedly bouncing on the bed.... "Happy Christmas tree day!"

We had chocolate chip pancakes to celebrate the occasion and then set out on our adventure. Our mission: an 8 foot evergreen, not too sparse and not too bushy.

We started by perusing a property owned by my husbands business (he works in the construction business, the property is one they plan to develop) and found that most of the trees were closer to 80 feet than 8. I did, however, collect some clipping for my wreaths. The van got a teensy weensy bit stuck in the snow, but we got loose and headed onwards to our next destination.

Next we travelled some back roads. It's not that I'm against paying for a Christmas tree... it's just that we thought we'd check all the "free" ones first. No such luck.

We headed out to a tree farm we'd seen up the highway, only to discover it is not a farm at all... they only sell cut trees (expensive ones!). So we figured that since we were almost to the city anyways, we might as well do some shopping. We went to the mall. On a Saturday. On Saturday December First. In the afternoon. Are we crazy?

So we made it out of there alive (barely) and headed home. I'd seen an add in the local paper for a tree farm up north, so i grabbed the paper and we took off again. By this time it's 3 o'clock, and the farm is open until 4... we were pretty sure we'd make it in time.

I had called before leaving and had been told the trees were only 20 dollars. Sweet! If only we could find the damned place. We drove along the road it was supposedly on several times over. The house numbers managed to skip from 456 to 1770 with nothing but barren wilderness in between; we were looking for 1546.

We tried to call but the cell phone insisted it was a long distance call. Phooey.

So we headed up to a nearby town. I'd seen an add for a tree farm up that way, and although i didn't have directions i knew what road it was off of... so i figured we'd be okay. Surely they would have signs????

After about an hour of searching, including a stop off at my nearby parents' house to check the Internet for directions, we found the place. I think they had about 15 trees. 14 of them were dead and brown and ugly. The nice one was about 3 feet tall. No such luck.

I cried on the way home. Give me a break, I'm pregnant and emotional. It was too dark to keep hunting for a tree, so we went home and made rainbow cake and watched batman and sulked.

Today we will try again. Wish us luck.



Click here to read "the perfect tree, part 2"