From The Mud Puddle

As the adventurous day started to draw to a close today, my husband looked at me and asked, "Are you going to blog about it"? I said, "Yep"!

My last post mentioned that today was the day that we had to wait until to find out if the Christmas tree lot of choice was going to have any ball/live trees, you know, the ones with all the roots still attached. This afternoon, we set out to the farm that is near here. They didn't have any as they thought they would. They called over to the lot near the mall, and asked them if they took them all over there. Sure enough, they had. So off we went to the tree lot in Burlington. (no not the one with the big Santa...)

When we arrived we noticed that indeed they did have the trees, but they were all so BIG! We asked if they were going to get any smaller ones. They said no. We walked the lot of the cut trees and just didn't see anything that fit what we wanted in the same way as a live ball root tree. We decided to go ahead with one of the ones they had, even though it was huge. (top to the bottom of the roots it comes one foot shy of our ceiling)

We told the people working there and paid them for the tree. The men tried to load in in our trunk the way that we've done it the past several years we've had these kind of Christmas trees. The roots wouldn't fit. The tree was extremely heavy too. So, we drove home to get the van. Jay and Christopher returned to the tree lot to pick up the tree. The men tried to load it, but couldn't get it in. This one guy, Ray, told them to all step aside. He then heaved it into the van with one swift lift. Jay and Christopher returned home with the tree.

They knew it was going to be a chore to get it inside. It always is. They worked and worked, struggling to get it first out of the van...and the struggling more to get it up the four front steps we have. Finally they made it to the top and to the inside!

"Oh no"! We all said..."it wont fit into the wash tub"! Sighz...

At this point, dinner was ready to eat...so we ate dinner and thought about the problem. The tree was ours at this point and we had a few choices to make. We could have just taken it down the steps again, planted it , put lights on it and called it a day. We could have likewise put it in a storage container. I just couldn't wrap my mind around that one yet. It just seemed so ugly! So we went off to Wal-Mart to see if we could find at least a nice colored storage container, perhaps even something festive. As we pulled into the parking lot, we talked about checking at Tractor Supply for something first, just in case they had something. We went in and sure enough, they had these feed containers that were made out of this black heavy duty rubber stuff. It was a bit more than we wanted to put into something for the tree-but it would look a lot better than a storage container.

We walked down to Wal-Mart, talking about our options. It seemed that we really didn't have many. Wal-Mart didn't have anything appropriate (or better than what we had at home), so we returned to the Tractor Supply place and took another look at the feed containers. We decided to buy one of those.

We brought it home and Jay and Christopher got the tree set up in it. They worked on getting it even. They put a rock under it to even it up. It is HUGE. I am not kidding, this tree is massive. It is much bigger than any root tree we've ever had. Honestly, to me, it is just too much tree, but at this point what are we going to do?

Quickly we decorated it with lights and the ornaments we had ready. That part didn't take long, perhaps an hour. It looks really nice, albeit very big.

Problem now is....I think I am allergic to this tree. My eyes started feeling irritated...my head hurts and well, I can tell.(especially since I can also tell in my lungs) I am hoping the smell dies down some...but right now it is strong...and I am suffering. I may be OK once we get going with phone books, but Jay also knows that there is that chance that we might just have to take it outside...put the lights on it out there and be done with it all unfortunately. I have never had problems with the trees like this...but this time...this time I can tell. I really hope we do not have to do this. It would be a shame to have to go ahead and replant it now....but if things stay like this with my eyes, lungs and head...we'll have to.

Pictures will come...later, God willing.