2008 Christmas Tree Hunt

I took Kim’s email to her parents and converted it to a blog entry. She originally wrote this December 8, 2008. -Bill

We’re back from the trip to NC. We got in late last night, gave Riley a bath, put him to bed, put the tree up and went to bed ourselves. We were EXHAUSTED! That mountain air really got us! Riley really behaved well on the ride up and back. He just sat in his car seat, looking out the window, sucking his paci and holding his blanket! Sometimes he read a book or played with his cell phone. He was a dream. How did we get so lucky?

This is the cabin we stayed in. It was very nice…we really enjoyed it!

The weather was VERY cold up there…they thought they’d get some snow Saturday night! We all huddled on the couch with blankets and tried to keep warm! I put Riley in some slipper socks to keep his little feet warm.

There was an upstairs loft in the cabin and Riley sure liked hanging out up there! We put him to bed in his pack and play up there around 9pm and he wouldn’t have it. He SCREAMED until I went up there and rocked him to sleep in my arms. I think he was scared.

Riley loved playing with the cupboards! Since there were no safety locks on them he could open and close them as much as he wanted.

All Riley wanted to do was go up and down the stairs, over and over and over and over and over and over again. He’d laugh and try to get up there real fast before we caught him. You should have seen him try to slide down them like he does at home! It didn’t work too well!

We went to get the tree yesterday (Sunday). It was FREEZING! I had Riley in a turtle neck and sweatshirt, then a heavy winter jacket with a hat and gloves on. I can’t believe he kept the gloves on!

Here’s Paul Bunyon in the woods, hunting for our tree! It took us over an hour to find a good one…we kept arguing over them! HA HA HA HA I think we were both looking for something we would never find. There are no “perfect” real trees in the world! That stick he’s holding measures how tall the tree is. We got one that was about 8 feet tall.

We’re freezing our butts off! I carried Riley in the backpack while Bill did the tree hunting.

After about an hour, we finally agreed on a tree! This is it! We had to cut the top off a bit to fit in the living room though. We managed to put the lights on it last night before we went to bed and I finished the decorating today. The whole house smells like PINE. Bill is in LOVE with that smell!

Bill cuts the tree down!

A Man and His Tree. What a tough guy, huh?

This is the truck that brought us down to all the trees. Riley liked the ride and kept pointing at the truck, saying “TRUCK!”

Riley was EXHAUSTED. When we got back up to the lodge, he ate an ENTIRE HAMBURGER (for breakfast he ate THREE pancakes!)! What a pig!