O Christmas Tree...

Christmas Tree Farm Fun!

O Christmas Tree, how little are your branches! We decided to start a little tradition last year and let the kids go pick out their own "real" Christmas tree for them to decorate which has turned out to be a lot of fun. I love the tiny little branches! This year we went to Bottoms Tree Farm and we might just be going back there every year. It was such a great experience. We aren't your traditional Christmas tree choosing family because we aren't looking for our main tree(we haven't made the jump to a live tree for that one yet!), we are only looking for a small kid-size tree. I love the idea of going and getting a live tree, I'm just not ready for it to be 9 feet tall yet, so this kid-size tree is perfect for us! The only problem is, we never make it out to pick our tree soon enough for any of the Charlie Brown trees to be left to cut down. Luckily for us, this year at Bottoms Farm, they were still willing to let us cut one down. Yay! The best part was... we actually got to cut down a big tree and then just cut off the top of the tree to make our kid-size one! How awesome is that?!? We were so pumped! The nice man in charge drove us around the property on his little tractor thingy, which the boys loved, and helped us haul in the big tree. It was customer service at it's finest. We loved it! I absolutely love how the tree turned out looking and because we were able to cut down the whole tree, we were even able to start a little ornament tradition! Check this out...

Live tree ornament - Edition One!

Pretty cool huh?!? It is a piece of the bottom of the big tree we cut down to make our kid-size tree! We are going to put a hole in the top and then attach a ribbon and bow to it so we can hang it on our tree each year! A live tree with live ornaments... so fun! I just hope we can get them to let us cut down a big one each year and then just take the top!:) If so, we'll keep the live tree ornament tradition going!

Ready to run go pick out their tree!

Don't know why Hayden insisted on sitting on top of this picnic table,
other than the fact he desperately wanted to jump
off of it, but it made for a cute pic!

The boys love those huge lights, so once we got home from our tree adventure I let them use those to decorate their tree...

Decorating away!

Can you tell he was proud of the work he was doing?!?

Sawyer even helped out on the lower limbs!

Although he mostly just sat right under Hayden's feet
and admired his work! He did give Hayden a few
opinions on where he thought the lights
should go(at least I think that is
what he was doing with those
loud outbursts I kept
hearing!!!)! So
much fun!

Loving his job!

Mad at me for wanting him to sit still so I could
get his picture with their finished tree!

Getting a little better when I mentioned he
could scoot away if he'd give me a smile!

And off he goes... happy as can be!

What can I say, scooting makes the boy happy!:)

And cruising does too!

Taking pictures by their perfectly
decorated tree... not so much!

Did they do good or what?!?

Don't judge, Daddy and I had absolutely nothing to do with the decorating of this tree. We opted for no ornaments after it took a little over 30 minutes to get the lights just how they wanted them! Maybe we'll venture into some ornaments(at least our live tree one!) next year... they can get a little complicated with no help! We really had a good time with this little tree and look forward to doing it again next year. Thank you Bottoms Farm for making it possible for us! Check out the boys scooting competition after the tree decorating...

Sawyer gets serious about his scooting...

But if Hayden can find a way around him, he has to win!:)

We have little scooting competitions around here often because it's just so much fun. My short little legs can't seem to win one though!!! Along with the boys little tree, we also let the boys help us decorate our big family tree back when we put that up. Here are the boys putting on the very first ornaments of the year...

Sawyer with his Mickey ornament...

And although this is hard to see, Hayden is putting up
his Lightning McQueen ornament! Yes, he's doing
it alone, yes it's Lenox, and YES I was
certain it was going to break!

Why do I let them put up Lenox ornaments you ask? Well, because they are their ornaments. I like to get them one "good" ornament each year and then I always let them pick out which one they want to put on the tree first. It is always the new "good" one they choose. How could I say no? As you can tell by the pictures, they get very into it which I love, so I guess when one of them breaks one one of these years I'll just break the super glue out!:) When we are decorating the little trees for their rooms, I don't get quite as worried about the ornaments, because most of them are "shatterproof". Whatever that means. I'm pretty certain if they chunked one of them it would break, but I don't want to find out so we haven't chunked one.... yet! They boys got a little wrapped up helping me with their trees in the rooms this year...

I feel pretty confident in saying I think Hayden
knew better than to play in my lights...

But after he decided it would be a good idea,
we just started having fun with it!

I even let Sawyer get all wrapped up!:)

But he didn't know quite what to think of that situation!

Hayden on the other hand... he had a blast!

Mainly because he knew it was out of the ordinary!

Putting the ornaments on the tree was a little more exciting to Sawyer!

Yes, that is a hook on the ornament. No, he didn't prick himself. I have no idea why I let them touch the ornaments with hooks. Normally I wouldn't even let them get near them, but for some reason I thought it was okay this time. Probably not the best Mommy decision, but a decision none the less. Not so sure if I'll let it happen again, but it worked out this time. No one got hurt and the boys had fun despite having to be very careful when putting on their ornaments!

This is how Sawyer looked at me when I let out a screech
because I thought he was going to get hurt
by one of the hooks... "What are you
worried about Mom, I got
this under control!"

And under control he did... he did a great job
staying safe and hanging his ornaments!

He would check the ornament out...

Pick a branch...

And make sure it hung just how he wanted it!

Hayden had fun helping with his tree too!

Especially the clapping and singing Christmas carols part!

Cute little guy!

Our finished room tree projects!

Can you tell he was proud of his tree when he was finished???

I will say here that Hayden did ask if he could get some more ornaments for his tree for next year. I'm pretty sure he didn't mean more, but he just meant different. There are Dr. Seuss ornaments on his tree, but the balls hanging on it are just plain(same ones as we use for our room actually!). I am thinking he meant "kid" ornaments instead of "more", so you may see that his tree changes up a bit next year if I can find some "kid" balls on clearance after the season is over!:)