It was Saturday, drizzly, grey, but unseasonably warm. We packed the boots, gloves, jackets, krispy kreme doughnuts, and water bottles into the Suburban and headed to the mountains.
First we stopped at a small town corner market for the tree permit. You've been to this place, more beer and wine on the walls than the inhabitants of the town. The bathroom was tiny, universal, and had old farm pictures that seemed right at home with the grey cement floor and giant red stained drain that you instinctively steered clear of. You thought about buying a pack of gum, but remembered the days of grandpa and his stale wrigley peppermint sticks he seemed too glad to hand out, and thought, this could be worse.
After flipping the map around 4 or 5 times, and reprimanding the bouncing children in the back atleast 3 times more often than that, we make the muddy ascent into the trees. With every passing vehicle that hails a captured tree the excitment builds.
We can't quite agree that we have found the right spot to start the hunt, so we drive on, winding and climbing. Finally our patience is waining and the threat of dusk beckons us to pull off onto a little road that requires 4 wheel drive and a little sense of adventure.
Ahh, out of the car. With an axe, a hatchet, and a bow-saw in hand, we spread out in search of the perfect tree. Up and down some steep hills, through a lot of poaky oak brush, we make our way deep into the forest. Okay, not that deep, but it sounds good. We do have to haul this thing back, and when I say we, I mean Brendan.
We could tell the troops were losing morale after a couple of unfruitful trails, so Brendan decided to hold a hack-a-thon. He named it after his basketball skills. We found some nice grey, dead logs on a trail and let the kids hack away, all the while teaching them the art of how to pass the sharp object to eachother. (the scout way)
Finally, Brendan spots it, it's huge, it's beautiful, and it's going down. We hack away, starting with the axe, and I get the privilege of finishin the beast off. One problem, this thing is massive, so we have to do a little more hacking to the trunk. A few more hacks by everyone and a little maneuvering to let Nathan feel like he felled the beast, the hunt was pronounced VICTORIOUS!
It was an awesome 6 hours of our lives.
4 comments:
Well, that is one way to do it! I hope your kids realize what a fun mom they have. We will go to grandmas to see her tree. Our place is too small for 7 people AND a tree. Keep blogging!
Oh, the small spaces, I've been there before. Good to have grandma close.
I'll try to continue to update.
That is a cool christmas tree. Looks like the boys enjoyed chopping stuff. =)
your daughter looks so much like you. we use to go to the mountains to get our trees growing up, it was so much fun. it turned out great!
glad to see you started a blog. way to go erika!
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