O Christmas Tree

Wow--this past week has been a little . . . hmmm . . . abnormal? crazy? I don't know but it is one of those weeks I look back on and say, "Phew".

Traditionally, we don't decorate for Christmas in our home until after Lina's birthday--Dec. 6th. My students' piano recital was on the 4th so we had a handful of decorations up, mainly in the entryway to make the house feel a little festive (actually, I shouldn't say "we"--while I was at Costco buying refreshments for the recital, DH and the kids put up some holiday decor). Anyway, come Dec. 7th and I was completely focused on Paige. Her funeral was Friday the 10th. DH left for Europe on business the 11th. I flew to Montana the 13th. Then the 14th was Miranda's Holiday band concert:

The 15th was Bird's Preschool Holiday concert:

Bird with his music teacher, Mr. Bill

And my parents came over to visit the 16th! Loved having them here to celebrate FEAST day with Lina and Krish, and just spend time with us.

The 17th was Miranda's middle school's award recognition ceremony:

This awesome girl made a 4.0 gpa her first semester!

Friday I literally had something scheduled every hour from 7am to 7pm.

Then I got an email from DH--his flight (the only flight from Amsterdam to Seattle that day) had been cancelled because of snow. NO! He was rebooked on a flight for Saturday. Drama all day long. Most flights that day were cancelled out of Amsterdam. But, a true blessing from heaven--he somehow managed to get on a flight to Vancouver, B.C. Friday night, which turned out to be one of the only flights that even left Amsterdam this entire weekend! Luckily he met some other people on the flight who live 20 minutes from us. One of their spouses went to Vancouver to pick them all up and I had to go get DH at 2:30am on Saturday. But it was only a 20 minute drive--in a terrible wind storm! There was debris all over the roads. It was SO crazy. AND I drove over a downed power line on the interstate!

I'm SO glad he is home :)

So, Saturday morning, after sleeping in, we went to get our tree. The kids were very excited. The tree lot supply was a little sparse, but we managed to find this beauty:

Yes, it's a little crooked.

And since Christmas is only a week away it was marked down 30%. Whoo Hoo! We brought it home and set it up in the family room:

Perfect fit!

We couldn't decorate it yet though. We had to go to the Seattle airport to pick up DH's car. And stop at Carl's Jr. for lunch :) Then I had to come home for a hair appointment (priorities, right?). By the time I got home from that, and DH had made an amazing eggplant curry dinner BTW, we were SO tired. The kids were disappointed that we couldn't decorate the tree. They really wanted to put their ornaments on. But we told them dad had to do the lights first and he just couldn't stay awake any longer.

Well, he woke up at 4am this morning, put the lights on the tree AND baked zucchini chocolate chip bread! Finally after we got home from church we got the ornaments on the tree.

We also put up most of the remaining Christmas decorations. Usually we do lots of lights outside, but DH just decided to do one tree outside this year. Then I put the gifts under the tree that Grandma and Grandpa had brought over on Thursday, plus some gifts from aunts and uncles that had arrived in the mail. The kids are in heaven! I think the Christmas spirit has finally arrived at our house.

Oh, and I forgot to mention, Saturday morning I also finally managed to order our Christmas cards for this year. Hooray!

Now I just have to start shopping :)