A Very Merry Christmas Tree

We are a little late at putting up our Christmas tree this year. It's already December 5th. I had high hopes of decorating it as a family this year, but the hubs and I have strange schedules and the 4 of us are rarely in the same place, awake, at the same time. We had a small window of time yesterday morning, but Georgia lost (and badly lost. It was ugly.) the *big* game against LSU on Saturday, so the hubs spent the rest of the day trying to find some liquid recovery for the heartbreak. Sunday morning came fast and hard for the poor fella, and he was in no mood to be festive. So we let the big angry bear alone and did our own thing.

Besides, we hadn't really figured out the tree situation anyway. We usually buy a real tree. But we were waffling this year. Since Zane has an oral fixation (MAJOR!) we were nervous about the number of needles he would consume, and whether that would seriously pose a health risk to him. Can't you see the headline: "Baby overdoses on Douglas Fir needles, first case in years!". But then, did we really want to buy a fake tree? They are so ugly...unless you spend $200 on them, and in that case, I would assume you intend to use it for several years.

As always, Enter My Parents. They are always there for us, no matter what silly thing we need. So I asked my mom what we should do and we ultimately decided that we would borrow their small fake tree and they would put up their big one, even though it takes forever and is huge and seriously just a pain in the ass. They love us so much!

Kevin decided today was the day to decorate, so I shaped the tree up nicely and brought up a box of decorations from the basement. I'm not going all out this year. Zane is just too young and it would just be too insane. Now, if time/money/small hands were of no concern we would probably have a Georgia Bulldogs tree, and a Jon Bon Jovi tree, and a monster truck tree, and who knows what else. But one tree is more than enough this year.

I could spend hours drooling over beautiful magazine Christmas trees, or perfectly shaped and matched and gorgeous trees inside perfect homes. But this isn't a perfect home, and those trees aren't family trees. Now, if you have one and you've spent countless hours perfecting it, by all means, I am not trying to discount your work. It's just not what I expect from my tree. I expect my tree to be perfectly imperfect, and that's exactly what you get when you have a 3yr old project manager. Enjoy!

(disclaimer...I'm still learning how to perfect the use of my Nikon Coolpix for taking bloggie pics. If you have any suggestions, I'm more than happy to hear them!)

Zane is standing on his own A LOT these days. He even took 5 whole steps today!

And Kevin looks like he's 6 years old or something. Slow down kiddo!

He had his heart set on decorating with monster trucks. So he lined them all up and I let him choose 6 to become ornaments for the next month.

Finding a home for each one :)

He thought he could put the star on by himself, so I decided to let him give it a stretch.

I bought this when I found out I was pregnant with Kevin and it was on our Christmas tree in 2007.

This is Kevin. Yep. Can you believe it? Christmas 2008.

Grave Digger, of course, nestled into his branch.

Mark gave me this in the hospital last year :)

Yes! We have a Hot Light snow globe ornament from Krispy Kreme. And it's Kevin's favorite ornament on the tree!

My first Christmas away from home, in my apartment at college, I only had plastic shiny ornaments and I wasn't happy with my tree at all. So Mark bought me this one from a gas station. It's so ugly it's cute! :)

Kevin asked "Why is that Santa so ugly?" And I replied, "He isn't ugly. He's vintage." One of my cherished ornaments that belonged to my Gma.

Another of my very special Gma ornaments. It wouldn't be my Christmas tree without these!

Our Perfectly Imperfect Very Merry Christmas Tree!