A Tree? This Early??

Yesterday, Teacher Daughter Lisa invited us to go to Cassens' Christmas Tree Farm and help her pick out her Christmas tree. We were happy to go, but we did not intend to get one for ourselves - we usually to wait until the week before Christmas or so.

Cassens have one of the most beautiful barns in the county on their property.

And, one of the most beautiful old homes, too. Their farm is just down the road from the barn and depending on the route I take, I drive past them when I head out to visit Abby.

We found a pre-cut tree in the sales barn that Lisa really liked, but she still wanted to walk through the fields and see what was available in the cut-your-own sections.

We took a couple of the obligatory family photos.

Sometimes you find some interesting things when you part the branches of the pine trees - this one was stuffed full of pine cones!

And this one had hosted paper wasps over the summer.

At last Lisa found the perfect tree and we all agreed, it was nicer than the one in the barn.

Lisa got down on the ground with the saw and began cutting

and then James finished up the very last bit.

They carried the tree back up to the sales barn

where it was shaken to remove loose needles and then wrapped in netting for transport.

While I was checking out the antique sleigh,

Craig slipped back into the sales barn

and now we have our own Christmas tree! It's the earliest we have ever bought one, but we don't mind - our kids are coming home for Christmas and we have a lot to do to get ready. It made sense to get ours since we were already out there and had found one that we liked.

Check that off the to-do list and only a million and one more things to do to get ready! LOL

Don't forget the Breyer holiday blanket giveaway! Two lucky winners will be drawn and announced Monday or Tuesday. To enter, comment on any blog post from today or yesterday. (There were two yesterday, so you can comment on both.) Commenting closes at 11:59 PM EST tonight.