This was a different sort of adventure.. one filled with family and holiday tradition!
It started out with my younger son, Justus, driving me to get in his required hours so he can get his license. Giving up control of my wheels is a difficult thing for me, but he did fabulously...
Every year my relatives on the Peninsula go get their Forest Service tags and go out in search of their Christmas tree. I usually opt to buy mine, but this year I had the opportunity to join them, so I jumped at the chance. To get out there, we had to take a ferry and cross the Hood Canal Bridge. These were both great opportunities for new driving experience.
We arrived the evening before the tree expedition and spent some time looking at my Mom and Aunt's new beach cabin! It is so cute and cozy and I love the little beach. It has oyster shells on it and is nice and pebbly, with rocks I flipped over to look at the tiny shore crabs underneath. Fun! Here is Justus and my Mom on her beach.
The next day we joined up with my Aunt, Uncle, 2 cousins and one of their families, and friends and piled into three 4-wheel drive pick ups. The forest service roads above Quilcene were still snowy and in some places impassable, even for our vehicles.
In places where there was more snow, we actually got to do a little sledding. Cedar wasn't too thrilled with it all... the snow was not only cold, but melty and wet.
Justus found this awesome microcosm, worthy of an Avatar-like world.
We looked at tree after tree, and wandered up and down and through roads and trails. The more we looked, the less picky we became. We had gotten to the point that we barely cared if it had branches when there it was! The perfect tree for Yule! Justus and I took turns chopping it down with a hatchet... the saws were with the other two trucks.
The whole excursion took around 5 hours, but everyone went home happy. Mom was sweet enough to follow us all the way back across the bridge and the ferries that night with the tree in her truck, so we could set it up. Here is the end result:
I'm going to include the bit of story in between the tree-in-the-woods picture and the lit up tree picture: "And then Tina leapt from the vehicle and sprung up the multiple flights of stairs carrying the tree with her like it was nothing and in one fell swoop she had placed it in the tree stand and had it decorated and beautiful in an hour!" Said Mom. In an incredulous voice. :) Good job! Looked like a lot of fun.
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