Mission: Christmas Tree

This is the one!

Lights!

Orneryments!

White Feather models the tree skirt

...and finished!

Neil and his mother, Olive arrived a couple days ago from the UK. Our very first stop from the airport was Gander Mountain for some Baffin Impact boots for Olive. She most certainly needed them from the first moment she stepped out of the truck into our driveway. The very next day we were out on the lake with the snowmobile, blazing a new trail for the dogs so it could firm up over night and we would be able to run today. It also took four of us to shovel out the snow drifts from under the railroad bridge and pack a flat and safe trail. Under the current conditions, it was just too much to ask the dogs to try to set the trail after our unfortunate incident during our first attempt.

Next on the list was "Mission: Christmas Tree". Since the one we brought down from up north several weeks ago bit the dust a couple weeks ago and I was adamant that there would be a Christmas tree this year after spending the last several without, we headed out to a local tree farm to find the perfect tree. In a matter of moments after our arrival, Rebecca pointed to "the one" and it took but only moments longer before we had it on top of the truck and were heading home. Not at all what I remember from childhood; trudging through the knee deep snow in the wilderness going from tree to tree to tree for hours before finally cutting the "right" one. Or actually that's what it seemed as though my family was doing while I was sitting back at the car checking my hair in the mirror and complaining about how long it was taking.

We then spent the entire evening with Christmas music playing in the background while lights were hung and the tree was adorned with ornaments I had forgotten I had and the sled dogs panted on the couch because it had gotten far too hot with the buzz of activity. Ahhh, what a lovely evening.

Side note - ran the dogs today on the trail that had been allowed to set last night. All in all, it was a nice run. Twenty percent of the trail was now glare and/or crunchy ice instead of slush and the remainder is nicely packed snow. We are expecting to get another 5 inches of snow on Monday night into Tuesday which will only make the trails better. Yay! It's winter!