Today we went to the Ithaca Commons and looked around. We also went to Center Ithaca and snacked on some tasty Indian Food, saw a very non-authentic Santa Claus, and watched a children’s play.

After that we decided to go look for a Christmas tree. We had packed Grammy’s Kiddie Sled that our friend’s Jen and Jen had given Graem for Christmas. To our dismay, Graem was sleeping like a log when we got to the tree farm. So we left her in the car with the warm heater and Margot and I went to find “the perfect tree.”

We had read earlier in the newspaper that this was a “custom cut” place and to us that read “We will cut the tree customly for you.” Well, not quite the case… When we walked up to the owner he handed me this hand saw and directed saying “The good trees are over the hill.” Now, if you haven’t been to Ithaca you probably don’t understand the perplexity of these words.

So we started up this big hill, mind you there’s a couple of inches of snow on the ground, looking for the “perfect tree”. Each tree we saw had some imperfection. Either it was too blue, or too small, or too big, or not full enough, or dead. So after hiking into the forest of dead and ugly trees, Margot suggests that we start walking back and try this some other day because it was getting dark.

The whole time we’re walking back I keep joking about picking these ugly trees that only have about 4 branches. So finally we’ve almost made it back to the car … and there it is … “THE PERFECT TREE”!

So, I get on my hands and knees and start sawing the tree. There’s certainly a reason why we got our perfect tree for a mere $22.00. Boy, was that a pain. Not to mention the fact that you have to lug your tree back to the front and on top of the car! So much for “custom”.

We get the tree home and Margot cuts the bad branches at the bottom off and we set it up in the tree stand. By this time Graem has woken up from her midday nap and really doesn’t seem the least bit amused or interested in our tree. So we turn on some Christmas music and start decorating. We string lights, and put the Christmas ornaments all over the tree. We had a strategy which was: put all of the wooden and non-breakable ornaments towards the bottom 3 feet and all the glass and breakable ones on the top 3 feet.

Between the two cats, one dog, and one baby — Margot and I have placed a bet that by tomorrow morning at least 2 balls will be broken on the floor. We probably had over 10 Christmas ball casualties from last year’s tree. Each night we would hear a crash while lying in bed, wake up the next day to find that either Murphy or Peanut (our two cats) had been playing with the ornaments and they had fallen and broken.

I’ll post a picture of our Perfect Christmas Tree soon!