"tree"dition

on saturday we braved the weather and, despite the snow flurries and freezing rain, we made the scenic drive out to banks to the schmidlin tree farm in search of the perfect tree! this is always a fun outing for our family and we really look forward to it! last year was the first year we went to schmidlin's and we decided that that was the place to get a tree! they have the best trees we've ever seen in our many years of u-cut tree farms!

you're probably wondering why we drive all the way out to banks to buy a tree when we could find one that is so much closer to home. like i said before, the trees are awesome and the people are super friendly! we also, have made a day out of getting the tree. after finding the perfect tree, on our way home we stop at the little main street pizza parlor for pizza. nani even picked out the same booth that we sat in last year! she takes this tradition thing seriously!!

when we got there the heavens opened up and poured down buckets. then it turned to a few snow flurries, which are much more bearable than buckets of rain, especially when we didn't bring rain jackets for lala or myself and we had no umbrellas. as we walked through the fields to get to the trees, we could feel our feet get heavier with each step, as our boots got caked layer upon layer of fresh, squishy mud!

as is tradition, we find the first tree that we like, but can't just pick the first tree, we must look some more. however, inevitably, after sloshing through the muck and mud for another half hour, we always go back to the first tree that we found and cut it down! maybe next time we will save the thirty minutes and just cut down that first tree, but probably not! it's all about tradition, right!?

here's mitch educating the girls on how old our tree is! do you like the foggy effect on this picture? well, it actually occurred naturally, i didn't mess with this photo! really, i didn't! i was protecting the camera from the rain and wet by keeping it in my coat. i'd quickly take it out snap a few shots, then quickly hide it in my coat. apparently the lens fogged up. kind of cool looking, huh?


here's my strapping, youthful husband carrying our tree, and not to mention about to plow over our second daughter, single-handedly without any help! you should have seen him throw that tree over his shoulder, as if it were nothing! oh how i love a strong man!


this is probably my favorite part! first they shake all of the water and needles and bugs out of our tree (i wasn't quick enough fumbling with my coat buttons to capture that on film). then they send it through the "wrapper", that's what we call it.


and this is how it comes out, all cute and easy to maneuver!


and here are the girls toughin' it out in the cold, wet weather.


i'm not sure what lala was doing here. maybe trying to catch a flake or two of snow? she caught some in her hair!


now this is the way to go! kawena was the only one that didn't have mud caked on her pretty little shoes!

and the perfect tree! isn't it lovely? naw, i just thought the tree looked so funny that i had to take a picture of it as they unwrapped it!

i will post pictures of the tree once mitch finishes putting the last 600 lights on. yesterday, he worked on getting the lights on the tree, but i guess the 800 lights we had wasn't quite enough so he went out last night and got 600 more! i know, we go a bit crazy with the lights, but it is the dang brightest tree you'll ever see!