About that tree..............

.....Yeah....ummm......I never did go get the artificial tree from the attic.  I have a very nice, prim tree, a very BIG german twig tree but I just wasn't feeling the "fake" tree this year. 

So, there it was, two days before Christmas Eve and I had no tree.  It was bitterly cold that morning, I was contemplating my tree dilemna as I dressed to go across the road to the barn to feed the stray kitties.  This is a whole other story!  Do you know, we feed these strays, twice a day.  They are currently residing in the very bottom of our small barn.  We heat milk for them and bring them their food.  Kinda like room service!
ANYHOW, I thought since I was going out, in the snow and wind to feed them, that I would look in the field for a tree.....a small tree, since I didn't know where the Mr. was keeping the saw.  So, I grabbed a steak knife, Yes, a steak knife, and headed out.  I fed the cats, and them tromped thru the field thru the wind and snow until I found a little grove of the most pathetic trees you could ever see!  BINGO!  I couldn't decide, I eyed them all from every direction, finally deciding on one with a trunk I thought I could take down with a steak knife!  LOL  I "sawed" and "gnawed the trunk from every direction but I think it was frozen.  Got down on my knees in the snow and "sawed" away.  I'd saw some, then pull the tree some and then saw more on another side.  Finally there was enough that I could pull the tree over and snap the trunk.  I dragged my tree to the house, carrying it up the driveway easily because it was so light as there just wasn't much to it.  I was almost to the house and my daughter-in-law opened her back door at just that moment, took a look at my tree, and exclaimed, "What are you doing with "that thing"????

I tried to hide the steak knife but she saw it...........(I've been the brunt of many a joke over the past week)
Anyhow, I told her she would see, it would be great.  Major eye-roll here.  I got it in the house and then devised a way to make it stand, in water, inside my giant crock all without a tree stand.  I'm not even going to go into that because you all would think I've lost my mind at this point but, I did get it to stand! 
Poor thing, it didn't get decorated until Christmas Eve day, I had to let it thaw.........and it was subject during this time to ALOT of ridicule.

However, I did decorate it.  I did not use any of my normal tree decorations except for the lights.  I then added dried orange slices, and these plastic icicle ornaments from the 1950's that I've never used until now.  I then strung two bags of cranberries and added these to the tree.  It needed something more.  So that night I made these big gingerbread cookies and when they were cooled, I strung them on red cording and hung them as well. 

I love my tree.  I hate to take it down but it does need to go now. 
This is the best picture I could get of it, my camera really is not cooperating with me lately but  you get the idea!!

Might have to do this next year as well.....maybe string some popcorn then too.