A miracle happened in our house today. My husband admitted that I was right! This is a big day. It will go down in history, along with the first time he laughed at one of my jokes...3 years into our relationship. In order to understand how huge this is, I must provide you with a bit of a back story, so here goes. For four years, I have been trying to explain to Robbie that instead of scaling a 17 foot ladder and flinging ornaments onto the Christmas tree, we should move the whole thing over to the staircase and decorate it from upstairs and then turn it and decorate the other side. Every time I bring it up he grumbles and grunts about how that would never work. So I let him continue to scale a 17 foot ladder and fling ornaments onto the Christmas tree. I know how to pick my battles. Well, fast forward three years to last Christmas time when we had some friends over. As we were talking about our huge tree (one of Robbie's favorite subjects), someone mentioned that they had a friend who also had a two story Christmas tree and they slid it over to the staircase and decorated it from upstairs and then turned it to decorate the other side. Robbie's eyes lit up and he couldn't stop talking about what "genius idea" it was. Wait, what?!!?! Being the calm, controlled person I am, I started throwing things at him from across the room and jumping up and down screaming that I had been suggesting the same thing for THREE YEARS!!!! He maintains that it was a misunderstanding. He apparently thought my idea had something to do with twirling the tree on it's side, before we put it up. I maintain that he doesn't listen very well. To his credit, he did stand up during dinner on Christmas Eve and announce to my entire extended family that I had been right about something, which for me, was definitely a highlight of our 13 year relationship.
Today was the day I have been waiting for since the first tree decorating experience in 2009. It started with a trip (in the torrential down pour, because that is apparently the only way we do it) to my parents' house to find our tree. Robbie has had his eye on a big cedar in the front corner of my dad's yard since this time last year. Being that my grandpa was a Christmas tree farmer, I'm a big fan of a REAL Christmas tree and I'm also particular about what type of tree I like. If it's not a Nobel, I'm not that impressed. Again, even though my husband would probably disagree, I do know how to pick my battles, so I agreed to the cedar. Despite the monsoon conditions, we (and by we I mean Robbie) got the tree cut down in just a few minutes.
And then, disaster struck. As we were loading the tree into the truck, the top snapped off. And just like that we were back at square one. So after 40 or so more very wet minutes we finally had a tree in our truck.
When we got home, we put it in the garage to dry off...
And then Robbie had to go to work and I wanted to shut the garage so we stood it up in the driveway...
We were lucky enough to have some friends that were willing to come help us get it in the house and then it was time for the fun to begin. We started by plugging in all the lights to make sure that they worked...
And then we decided that we wanted the kids to help, so we woke them up...
They had a good time helping me unpack all of the ornaments and loved finding all of their favorites...
Finally, the lights were done and I don't think I have ever been happier than when I heard Robbie say. "This is so much easier." I KNOW!!!
When we were first married, we discovered that we both have the same "Baby's First Christams" ornament so we always hang them together at the top. Usually it is a life risking manuver to get them up there but today he just reached over the railing and plopped them on the top branch. Piece of cake!
The kids were in charge of decorating the downstairs portion of the tree and they were careful to find the perfect spot for each ornament...
When all was said and done, the kids were up way too late but the tree looked beautiful and I was right!!!
I am so SMART!!
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