Getting into the Christmas Spirit

Today was a busy but fun day. I don't think we could have crammed more Christmas activities in if we'd tried.

This morning we got the kids all dressed up and went to a Santa brunch at Makray Golf Club in Barrington. It's a public course so the brunch is open to everyone. It's reasonably priced, they have a professional photographer there and let you take your own pictures (the one on the right was the one I took, not quite card worthy but still cute). They email you their picture so you can use it however you want.  The one weird thing though was that when my kids started to tell Santa what they wanted he told them to write him a letter instead.  I guess because they do take their time with the pictures, they don't have time for the actually telling about wishes.

After we were done eating we all changed into warmer clothes and headed out to cut down our Christmas tree for the first time ever.  A friend of mine had recommended Oney's Tree Farm in Woodstock IL so that's where we headed. The weather wasn't that great. It was raining most of the ride there but by the time we arrived it was just misting and eventually stopped.

There is a little store and bakery right by the entrance but we skipped that and headed straight for the trees. You can bring your own saw or borrow one of their's (with a $20 deposit that is returned when you bring back the saw). There is a horse drawn wagon that brings you to the middle of the field and you just wander around among the trees until you find one you like. In the past we've usually gotten Fraser Firs but at this farm (and maybe it's this way at all of them), they are all mixed together which made finding the right tree a little trickier but still fun.  Little Man loved looking at all the little trees, especially the ones smaller than him.

It was extremely muddy after the rain, but the kids had fun with that ;). When we finally found our tree we were a little further and downhill from the wagon stop than the entrance so we walked back. Pretty tricky with a nine foot tree in the mud, but we made it back.

The farm workers shook our tree (to get any critters out). The kids thought that part was hysterical, and they bailed it for us and helped my husband get it onto our car. Note, they only lift it on the car, you are responsible for tying it down.

We stopped in the store to pay and have some cocoa, before heading back home. It took us a little over an hour to get back, but part of that was I didn't want to be barreling down 90 at my usual clip in case the tree did come loose - which it didn't.

We got it into our house really easily since it was bailed, and are letting it settle in a bit before we decorate it. Ok, ok, it settled in pretty quickly since it was so fresh, we were just too tired to do it.

After dinner we decided to keep the Christmas theme going and we all sat down to watch Charlie Brown's Christmas. It's fun to watch Christmas movies with the kids cause my daughters now know them well and often giggle in anticipation of the funny lines, while Little Man is really only appreciating them this year.

Nyhavn in the snow

We all slept very well after a fun but Christmas packed day. The only things missing were the Christmas cookies (I'm catching up on those today) and the fact that we still haven't had any snow. I read in the paper that if we didn't have any measurable snow today - we didn't - it would set a record for longest gap of snowy days for Chicago - 282 I think the number was. It makes it a little harder to get in the Christmas spirit without snow, but thankfully my friends and family in Denmark have been posting some gorgeous snowscapes on Facebook so at least I can enjoy their snow.

The view from my aunt's apartment