Wednesday

the tree

We went to the Christmas tree stand one block from our house last night, picked out our tree and then brought it home and decorated it.

Here are all the PHOTOS OF THE EVENING

Decorating the tree is one of my favorite parts of Christmas. The cousins came to help and Dr. Neighbor stopped by. We were going to make cookies but never got to that. We all had a great time, although as you can see from the photo below, Elliot began fading at the very end and in fact, was sound asleep on the couch within 90 seconds of this photo being taken.

This was Jon's first real Christmas tree. I would never want a fake one, but that's just me. When I was a kid, my father would take us all out on our farm to find and cut down and haul back a fresh cedar tree. Cedar trees are the REAL Tennessee Christmas tree.

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9 comments:

Anonymous said...

The look on your youngest son's face is priceless!

Anonymous said...

Elliot with the antlers has the exact same expression your brother Robert wore when I forced him to be photographed in the Native American costume (made from brown paper grocery bags. It's my favorite picture of Robert. That's now one of my favorite Christmas pictures. I think you should use it on a Christmas card. Love, mama

Anonymous said...

Only in TN will you see a photo of someone carrying/decorating a Christmas tree in a short sleeve shirt. ;) Great pics.

Katharine O'Moore-Klopf said...

You have a lovely family, Katie. Thanks for sharing your Christmas-decorating photos.

Anonymous said...

you do know that it is dangerous to get a real tree this far out from Christmas? a real tree should be up two weeks max. and thats pushing it. after our brand new fake tree collapsed a couple of years ago (it was a replacement for a very very old one that was build really really well) I decided oh goody I get my real tree. we put it up a few days before christmas and it comes down the day after new years. NO EXCEPTIONS. I sure dont want my house to burn down. I value my family way too much to put them at risk for some Martha Stewartesque vision. No thank you. Actually I may just get another fake one and try and find one with a more sturdy stand. that way I dont have to worry about the hazard and I can use my nice quilted tree skirt without it getting trashed. and no vacuuming. and no watering the sucker a couple of times a day (you DO water your tree at least daily Katie dont you? or are you too busy focusing on stupid minutiae that you forget that which is truly important?) the ONLY advantage I can think of for a real tree, and this is truly the only one that comes to mind, is the storage issue since we do not have much of a basement. YOu can get the same smell from a candle.
But suit yourself. Personally I think Christmas is waay overrated.

Anonymous said...

Whether you buy a real tree now or in 2 or 3 weeks, it was cut at the same time. (unless, of course, you go to a cut-your-own farm) If you buy now, it'll at least be watered. There some disadvantage of having in a heated area, but I'd guess watering outweighs that.

Anonymous said...

I always had a real tree growing up and for the following 15 years .I swore I would never get a tacky ,artificial tree.Well,I got tired of finding needles well into Spring so we bought a very well made(and excessively epensive) pre-lighted tree.Now I LOVE Christmas and my tree is always up and looking pretty shiny before the Thanksgiving weekend is done.What was I thinking all of those years? What a waste of money and energy.Now I just go and get clippings to decorate with and my house still has that "real" Christmas smell that we all love. JCB

laura linger said...

Artificial trees are not tacky. They are an absolute must when you live in a tinderbox state like I do. Here in Arizona, I don't see how or why anyone runs the risk of having a real tree. It's just unsafe.

I am an Indiana girl, so we always had a real tree when I was growing up. Making the transition was hard, but I understand that it is the smart thing to do. It's just too dry here.

I don't understand the attitude of "can't be bothered" with Christmas. You only go around once in this life and I cannot imagine depriving myself of something that I find so wonderful.

Anonymous said...

ah, but if I found it so wonderful I would be devoting a lot of energy to it. because I find it a highly overrated pain in the butt I do the minimal and find that what I do IS meaningful.