O, Tannenbaum

*All photos by Millie, except the one in which I insisted she join the other girls. :) Also, here's permission to people who also read Millie's blog to skip this post because only the video is new.



Well, I certainly nailed the timing of our Christmas tree hunt this year.  Two days after the Big Snow, I took all the children to the Christmas tree farm while John was at work. Thank goodness for Deborah. We deposited everybody except Millie, Annika, Susannah, and Lucinda at her house while we went to chop two trees right down the road. 

Let it be known that Annika is far too cheerful about trudging through thigh-deep snow UP A GIANT HILL! (Remember this hill from last year?!)

For a more typical response, listen to this sideways human. She knows what she's talking about...

It was undeniably lovely up there, though, even though my legs were quivering by the time we reached the top.

We had several near misses with finding the right trees for Mopsy and us. I had to remove snow around the base of the tree to expose the trunk and then knock snow off the top before we even had an accurate idea of how tall or stout each tree in question was. 

Some of us tried to determine the right tree by greeting it with a hug.

That didn't work, either.

I lost my balance and was nearly lost for good.

All's well that ends well. It took us longer than expected, but we eventually made our way down the hill with the two trees, to be greeted at the bottom by admiring fans (no joke; we were). We felt like rock stars.

Then when Susannah and Lucinda knocked on the house door to pay the owners, they said they'd been watching us make our way up and down and refused payment. "Go and get yourselves some ice cream with the money," the kind man at the door said, "You deserve it." (This garnered our admiration for life!)

And we will.  You can count on it.

 

Eve of Christmas Eve

Decking the tree out in baubles and lights...

 

Must Be Done

Scoff if you will, but twinkle light crowns always come first.

Skylark and Cadence were both bewitched by the light crowns this year. Here's Skylark, not knowing I'd returned to take a video of her singing softly, "Me love God. Me love God in the highest."

I love these two pictures of Cadence. They are utterly Cadence-- beautiful or Funny Bunny depending on the second.

"

I almost never think Lucinda looks like me. I see a lot of John's Grandma Owen in her.

HERE-- however, I see myself.

Piper looking like a grown-up....

And, MAN, do I wish I had a video of this. I turned around and Joel was draped in lights singing, "I'm a Christmas priiiiinceeeess."  

You'll have to imagine it, because he only lasted a few seconds before cracking up.

 

Christmas Cheer All Through the Night

Stocking-stretching right before bed (reaps greater earthly rewards than quad stretching).

And then the whole house went to sleep, even Ransom, my faithful companion.

He stayed by my side through All The Cookies.

As always, my photo-realistic representation of my children in cookie form was spot-on. I'm sure there's no need for me to tell you which cookie belongs to which child.  They look so realistic you probably did not even realize they were cookies instead of my children!  (Oldest to youngest, beginning with Mildred...)

Thank goodness. This year I finished it all before dawn broke.

Peace.