After last year’s Texas Christmas tree experience we decided to do what real Texans do…we went to the store and bought our tree. In the Northwest I never, ever would have thought about doing that. We’ve always cut down our own trees, sometimes with permits for the North Cascades, but usually from a local tree farm. It wasn’t unusual for us to have 2 or more trees on the top of the car and one in the back. We’d spend hours looking at tree after tree analyzing its finer qualities and debating about which was the best tree in all the land. This year was a little different. This year we pulled up to Costco, payed our $40 and got a tree from the back of a refrigerated semi-truck trailer. It was the fastest, least traumatic tree finding experience I can remember.
I’m not sure if this is something all Costco stores do or if this is just a thing they do in states like Texas with a tree deficit, but the trees had yet to arrive by 2pm (when I was there to get gas) and by 5:30pm (when we got our tree) the truck was a third or more empty already. So if you want to be like us and get yourself a Costco tree you’d better hurry.
It is also the first time in my adult life that I can remember having a tree all wrapped up. I’d always scoffed at paying the extra money to wrap it in plastic. They always fit on the car just fine. We had no idea what it was going to look like. They offered to open it up for us, but we decided we’d risk it. We needed some sort of adventure out of the whole experience. And after all it is Costco. If we opened it and it was terrible they’d take it back. And as it turns out it is a nice looking tree. Not very big (7ft, noble), but Wesley thinks it is huge so that is all that count.
Here is a time lapse video I made of pictures Amber took of the unraveling of the tree. You can see the kids are excited.
Wesley turned three. You know that by now. And not just because I’ve written about it on this website, but also because he’s been talking about turning three since Jillian’s birthday in August. For months now he’s been asking if it was his birthday and then given the response is always “no” asking when is his birthday. And finally it came. And it was over. But not really. He got almost a week worth of birthdays. He deserves it.
We started on the morning of his actual birthday by opening a few presents. He likes to open presents. And then continued celebrating by going out to lunch, all four of us, even though it was a work day.
Kind of excited.
That evening we opened a few presents. The next day of course was Thanksgiving. And that means a party and to Wesley every party is especially for him. Especially when the party comes with juice boxes and dessert.
On Friday he got to hang out with me all day since I had the day off. Not to toot my own horn or anything, but to Wesley that is fun, maybe not as fun as a party, but still fun.
On Saturday we prepared for his real party. We decided that instead of doing a big elaborate cake which would be both time consuming and hard to get to the park we would let Wesley decorate cupcakes for his party. He had a blast for at least the first 15 or so. The last few took a little coaxing to get him to finish.
Decorating cupcakes.
Too many blue sprinkles.
I'm three.
The original plan was to meet up at the park and then walk over to the fire station for a tour and afterwords come back to the park and have the party. Remember that it was 80F on Thursday. Saturday of course turns out chilly and then as we are at the park setting up it starts pouring. So change of plans, no preparty. Instead we met at the fire station.
I had my concerns. Our group was pretty young, the oldest are in Kindergarten, and I’ve been on tours with other groups of kids that were a little academic. Luckily, the firemen were great. They pretty much let the kids run amuck. On the trucks, in the trucks around the garage. It was great. The kids had a good time and even came away with some hats and stickers.
Ready for action.
New recruits.
We thought we might have to have the party in the back of our Subaru, but luckily it had dried out by the time we were done with our tour. So we set back up at the park and had a nice little party. Wesley opened more presents, blew out candles (even though it was too windy to get them lit) and ate cupcakes. All in all it was rather nice and much less stress than our usual birthday celebrations.
He didn't notice they weren't lit.
More goodies.
After the party we played with his new toys. And for no real reason took turns dressing up in his new chef’s outfit.
Wesley is goofy.
Dad too.
And Jillian...
And Mommy too!
For the first time in a long time we had a relatively relaxing and low-key Thanksgiving. We didn’t cook a turkey or a ham. All we made was dessert (apple crisp and a banana cream pie) and then showed up at Kerry and Bill’s in Hutto. We got together with a bunch of mutual friends and had a nice afternoon, talking, eating, watching football and even playing a little Nintendo Wii.
The ladies did most (probably all) of the cooking. Dinner was delicious.
Kerry makes greenbeans
Amber Makes Gravy
Building up an appetite
Headed for the NFL
All the food was really good. From the turkey to the chestnut dressing. Even the parsnips were yummy.
Collin likes dinner!
Wesley pretends to eat.
The only downside to not hosting dinner is not having any leftovers. Okay, we’ve got lots of pie and crisp, but it is hard to make a sandwich with leftover apple crisp.
Tags: Thanksgiving
We didn’t forget that it was Wesley’s birthday on Wednesday. We are just saving the big post for after his birthday party Saturday. In case you can’t wait, here is a photo.
Even though his party isn’t until Saturday we’ve still had some fun. He has opened a few presents and I came home from work mid-day and we all went out to lunch at Burger King. Later in the day he spent some of his birthday money shopping with Amber and Jillian and got himself a stuffed orca among other things.