O Christmas Tree (or, "This Would Have Been Easier at Home Depot")

I grew up in the country. We didn't have a farm, but we passed cows everyday.

When I became a young adult in Pennsylvania my friends and I celebrated the great outdoors at Christmas by hiking out through a tree farm to cut down the perfect evergreen. We would bundle up because the weather was always frigid. Whoever had to lay down in the snow or frozen mud with the saw ended up with frozen fingers. Ahh, but it was worth it. We had the perfect, fresh Christmas tree. Nothing beats the smell, the tradition and the experience.

It has been 15 years since we lived in Pennsylvania. We've always had a real tree, but it came from a tree lot.

This year Brad found an ad for a tree farm in Pungo. That's the redneck, I mean rural part of Virginia Beach. Having a rare Saturday with no obligations, we decided to make a family memory. So we drove thirty minutes to Pungo to give our children the priviledge of finding our own fresh tree.

Well, it wasn't exactly like the tree farms of our youth. The weather was quite warm, probably 65 degrees. The farm was really, really small. It was so small that one of the two types of trees they raised was actually sold out. So that left us with a small field of white pine. White pines are not my idea of a Christmas tree. They have long needles and are very sticky. But we were determined to have a great time anyway so we tromped through the acre or two of fluffy white pines to find the perfect size and shape tree.

The boys were not impressed. Daniel's take on the whole situation was "This would have been easier at Home Depot." (I thought that was hysterical!) So much for an idyllic family memory. Most of our occassions are marked by Daniel's unique perspective and we'll treasure those memories just as much.

So we settled on a nice 7 foot tree and I have to admit it is the prettiest Christmas tree I've ever had. White pines aren't bad after all. But next year we'll probably be back at Home Depot.