This weekend we made time to go and get our Christmas tree. We opt for the real trees each year--a particular favorite of Quinn's and they are beautiful. Here is a picture of Liesl studiously cutting off the blue netting.
Here is Drew trying not to look creepy and failing. "I'm just smiling and being supportive." Ah-huh.
Liesl even changed her clothes so that she could replicate her outfit from last year. We spent a while getting out all the ornaments. Maia and Lily did an amazing job with the garland around the edges of the room and the stairs and one of the beams. They even got the lighting to work out! Drew and Eli finished up with the other beams, as we all reminisced about our glorious days of ignorance when we, well, the kids, would walk back and forth over the beams just for fun. Now, once a year they do. We even put up hammocks in our front room the first year...and then we saw the stress fractures and possibly more breaks in the wood. Well, we didn't want to take any other chances but the kids remember the beam walking with fondness.
Maia suggested putting up supports on the beams this one time of year and decorating them. Love it!
Eli and Liesl carried the tree in together and did a great job.
This year we checked out Menard's Christmas tree options and then went back to Eli's place of preference, Lowes. There is just such an open spirit of fun and a much better selection! (Now I just need a discount at Lowe's for that shameless plug, lol.)
We had a feisty selection process to get our tree. Lily's tree won despite my shameless strategy of naming my tree "Penelope's Tree." (She ended up voting for Lily's as well.)
As a missionary at church brought up when referencing the mood at our Turkey Bowl, "they'll take you down with a gleam of glory in their eyes, but then help you up quickly with geniune inquiries after your well-being." Oh, yeah. We're a fun bunch!
The selection video:
And speaking of Turkey Bowl, here's a video of the survivors...those who made it to the bitter end.
...front...
...and back.
On Black Friday, we drove a ways to meet up with Tova and hit up some stores in the middle. We were also able to treat Elder Flowers to brunch, and we ordered 14 sandwiches from Tim Horton's. Apparently, ordering that many sandwiches is a problem on Black Friday. It took about 25 minutes to get them, although I am pretty sure I saw them making sandwiches for any other order that came through during the process so that some of them were a little on the cool side. Harumph.
Eli and Penelope were troopers waiting on the side:
