Well.
That was crazy.
I tried to do some writing Sunday night and when I clicked onto my blog all I saw was a blank page with some sort of gobbel-de-gook message about bad synapses or widgets or something. I promptly threw up my hands a yelled for help.
Girls, I’m telling you that it pays to be married to a self confessed geek.
So, now I’m back and will continue with the post I wanted to do before my synapses and widgets conspired against me.
A CHRISTMAS STORY
I can’t remember the last time we put up a real tree. I know that it has been several years because at some point we decided that the hassle of getting it up only to have to take it down before we left for our parent’s house was just not worth it. The girls didn’t mind. They never thought Christmas started until we got to the grandparents anyway.
But as I’ve said, this year we are staying home and so off JD and the girls went to get our tree. They picked out quite the beauty.
When I was little, Daddy and we kids would take an ax and go cut down a tree out of some field. As far as I know we never paid for a tree in our life. From year to year the shape of the tree would vary greatly. For some reason one year Mama and Mike went alone to get a tree. Mama must have forgotten that our house only had 8 foot ceilings because she brought back a tree that was so tall that Daddy had to cut about 4 feet off the top. After that it looked more like a green bushy rectangle than a Christmas tree, but we loved it anyway.
Mama never got to go get the tree again.
When we got the tree home, Daddy would plop it down in a 5 gallon bucket and wedge rocks down in it to keep that tree straight. We’d turn the thing round and round trying to hide the ugly side of the tree (and there was always an ugly side). Then we’d wrap a sheet around the bucket and start putting on lights. Lights that were multi-colored and had bulbs the size of small eggs. The ornaments I remember most fondly were some plastic fruit that had little scenes inside them that we made one year from a kit and some elf heads on a string. The only breakable ornament I remember was the bell that had my brothers first grade picture in it. Why is it I can remember that and not what I walked into the room to get just a minute ago?
Note to my siblings: I call the elf heads!
Meanwhile, back at our house. JD and the girls returned and we set the tree up in its stand. There was no ugly side as it looked like it had been suspiciously manicured to a perfect triangular shape. The lights went up. The lights were too few in number. There was a trip to the Wal-mart where I discovered that if you wait until 5 days before Christmas you will find no lights. I made a trip to our hardware store. Lights!!! LED lights even! Bought them, brought them home. strung them around the tree, plugged them in, stepped back to admire……
They didn’t match.
LED lights may save you a bunch of money, but they burn a weird bluish color.
The lights came off.
As did most of my Christmas spirit.
At last, the final ornament was hung. We finally had a tree worthy of the beautiful (breakable) ornaments my brother has been buying my girls for Christmas since they were born. They love these ornaments. Whenever Mike makes noises about getting them something else, they protest mightily.
We stood back and admired our handiwork. Even sparsely lit, it was a beautiful tree.
Exactly one hour later it crashed to the floor. No one was within 5 feet of it. It just fell flat over.
Let me say that I could hardly make myself walk over to it. I was so afraid of what I was going to find. I just knew that 10 years of Lennox ornaments were going to be in pieces. The girls were crying their eyes out. The dog was hiding. I think JD was, too.
Ornaments lay in pieces all over. They were broken so badly that all I could do was scoop up the pieces and throw them away.
But only one of Uncle Mike’s ornaments was damaged. Mickey lost a foot, but it was a clean break and with some super glue you’ll never be able to tell anything happened.
We had ourselves our own little Christmas miracle.
But next year?
We’ll be using the 5 gallon bucket.
Don’t forget the rocks…..
Enjoy your time at home together! It’s priceless…..
You’ll get the hang of it. From time to time the tree falls over…been there several times. I hate the LED lights as well. Have thrown all of them out despite their energy savings. Enjoy the first of many Christmas traditions.
We need pictures. We used a bucket for YEARS and sometimes wire hung to the wall. Eventually we moved to a heavy duty tree stand which worked like a charm – until we moved to CO – evergreen country – where we finally purchased an artificial 9′ tree and we love it. You have a lot of years to catch up to this point. Enjoy. Merry Christmas to all.
Mike and I had to go get the tree that year because your dad was in the bed sick with the flu. In all of the yrs we had been married it was the first time he had ever been sick enough to be in the bed. So Mike and I went looking for a tree and we found it in a ditch along side the road. it did’nt look all that tall in that ditch and so we brought it home. Funniest tree ever but a great memory for Mike and I.