Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree (Farm)

One of our very favorite family traditions is making the annual trek out into the country to cut a Christmas tree. The excursion involves Christmas music in the van (usually Vince Guaraldi's "A Charlie Brown Christmas"), debate about what variety of tree we should choose (we tend to be a White Pine family, but not always), each child getting a turn with the tree saw, cries of "Timber!" when the tree falls, and the whole clan helping drag it back to the barn for tree shaking and wrapping. Then the kids and I pig-out on mini donuts while Randy pays for the tree.

Some day, when it's not her naptime, and she's not hungry, and wearing mittens isn't making her ABSOLUTELY FURIOUS, I am confident that Mira, too, will embrace this beloved annual outing.

Just not this year...

Furious

Could she be more miserable?

Mira's probably still writhing in my arms, but Gracie's blocking her in the picture

A tantrum like that really takes it out of you

The tree is up and decorated - and wired securely to the wall. Breakable ornaments are hung near the top, and so far we haven't had too many issues with certain short folks "re-decorating" the tree - although either she or Fred got into the water in the stand. For the life of me, I cannot imagine how we're going to put presents under the tree this year, though. She'll have those gifts unwrapped in record time, and Ethan may take advantage of the situation and unwrap some himself, knowing that she'll be the prime suspect. We'll have to see how this plays out...