oh how we love your branches...

but not your bugs...oh yes, folks - i must explain! (lori d. - this ones for you!)

after much lamenting on my part because we were breaking our 7 year tradition of visiting motley's tree farm in little rock, we headed out friday morning to pick out the "price family" christmas tree...sounds simple enough, right...not particularly.

for those of you that know jeffrey & me up close & personal...you will know that we LOVE huge christmas trees...most years, we actually have to end up cutting the top of our tree off in order for it to fit in our living room! well, this year our ceilings are about 20 feet tall...so we knew that having a tall tree would be no problem...for us. however, virginia does not seem to have a high demand for the tall christmas tree types...thus began our hunt!

with the girls donning their first christmas outfits of the season, we headed out to a tree farm that was initiating into the "tree farm" world...no trees over 6 feet tall. no problem...that's just one place. we ventured on down the road a little bit to a farm that was to have some spruce & pine trees...there were some slightly "less vertically challenged" tannenbaums...but not a great fit for us! while we were in route to our THIRD tree farm of the day, i called to see if they had any trees that were about 10 -12 feet tall..."oh yes, we have exquisite frasier firs" - that should have been my first clue that this may not go as smoothly as we thought - yes, they were in fact exquisite...to the tune of...hold on to your hats people...$225!!!!!!!!!!! let me just spell that for you...two hundred and twenty - five dollars...for a christmas tree! we kindly "oohed & aahed" over the staggeringly expensive trees and got in our car. defeated.

this was one of the few years that we did not have our tree the day after thanksgiving...and i could just feel the christmas season hours dwindling down...i truly LOVE having a tree in our home!

so we got back on the horse yesterday morning & headed to our fourth and FINAL tree farm...moose apple tree farm in berryville, va to be exact! they had some beautiful trees and we did our usual dance of "ooh, this one's good...but look at that one...ok, let's go back and look at that other one...ok, this is the one...are you sure...we're going to cut this one...i don't know..." and so on the story goes...every year.

our children were melting, even though it was 40 degrees outside, so we chopped her down and loaded her up!

we get home and are putting our beauty in the stand...i am holding it straight (still in the netting) while jeffrey secures it in the stand. this is when the saga continues...i am studying the tree because it is right up in my face...and i notice LOTS (i say 100's - jeffrey says "no way"...i very much disagree) of SPIDERS AND BUGS! that's right, folks...the tree that we waited to find for two days is what i like to call "infested"...to say that i was freaking out would be an understatement. i immediately "front lined" emma...and called the tree farm to see what we could do. their suggestion...take the tree out and spray it with bug spray...

friends...we are talking about a 10 foot christmas tree. not an easy thing to just carry outside...but that is exactly what we (uh-hum, jeffrey) did. i made jeffrey use an entire can of bug spray and shake the devil out of this christmas tree. i don't' know if i am crazy or stupid...but after several hours on the front porch, i allowed him to bring this bug motel back into our home. that is how desperate i am to have a normal holiday this year. bye bye lovely pine smell...hello bug spray.

so far, i haven't seen any on the tree...but i am inspecting santa's beard to see what nests are being built!!!!!!!!!!

the girls had such a great time decorating the tree last night...especially ella! she was sweet hanging all of her "favorite" ornaments...since she has been doing this for SO long...she kept exclaiming that "she just loved christmas"!!!!!!! jeffrey and i love making these memories with our girls...it truly makes the holidays even more special.

we are so excited about spending the actual christmas holiday in the good ole south...but for now...i will spend the next 432 hours enjoying this tree...and looking for bugs!