A Charlie Brown Chistmas

 

All my life, I have only known Christmas trees that we have liberated from their earthly toil out in the wild. All but a single tree have been wild red cedar trees that thrive in our area in pastures or corners of land that don't get cared for regularly. In case you are wondering, the one non-red cedar tree was some sort of fir that we found one year. However, as my parents are good stewards of the land, we eventually ran through the plentiful supply of available red cedar trees and the last decade or so have required more hunting and more settling on which tree will literally make the "cut". 

Earlier this fall when I was helping on the farm to cut trees sprouting in our terraces which can cause problems with farming when they get bigger, I found two small red cedar trees that I left standing, hoping that in a future year I'll cut one or both of them down to serve as our annual Christmas tree. I had thought one might do for this year but by the time we got back from Thanksgiving, I wasn't sure I wanted to drive my surburanized vehicle a quarter mile back through a feel covered in six inches of snow to retrieve it. So instead I turned to plan B which I have had my eye on for a few years.

Somehow, perhaps through the natural seeding of past red cedar trees we have cut down, we have a half dozen or more red cedar sprouts growing down in the ditch of our back yard. I usually toss our used Christmas tree down in the ditch and then on some winter day with snow cover, burn it and all the twigs and branches I accumulate all summer long. Sometimes due to weather, the tree may roll around down there for a year or more before it finally gets burnt. One particular sprout really shot up this past year and was approaching what I though from 50 feet away and 50 feet higher in elevation looked to be around 6 feet. 

I grabbed my bow saw, hiked down the 50 feet of elevation to the bottom of the ditch and saw that the tree was actually closer to nine feet tall and was pretty rough looking. In fact, almost all the big branches lower down stuck off one side of the tree making it look more like a half of a traditional Christmas tree. Knowing that this was probably the last year I would be able to fit in inside our home with 8 feet ceilings and not wanting a large red cedar growing down in my ditch for the rest of my life, I made the decision and liberated it from it's earthly toil. 

Above is a picture of it looking at it from the "flat" side so it looks a bit better and taken in the early morning hours so as to disguise some of the ugliness. While it is not full or traditionally shaped, it does have a small footprint meaning I didn't have to slide the barrister bookcase our of the way as I normally do every year to make room. It also doesn't take up much room in our small living room and maybe best of all, I'm not sure it will require much watering as a larger tree does so perhaps it will stay fresh longer. As per normal, I dumped in a good dose of green food coloring into the initial watering and it soaked it up turning it a nice Christmas green.

Best of all, the smell of red cedar filling our house is divine!