Christmas is coming

For the last six years we have gone and cut down a Christmas tree at a local farm. For the last two Audrey has joined in the fun.

We go to Tannenbaum Farms. It is a fun place. You take a wagon ride out to the trees, they have a reindeer, a fire, hot cider and coco. The things memories are made of.

Last year Audrey was a little less than a month old. She came along bundled up in the sling. Based on the pictures I'm pretty sure it was realtively warm last year. I don't even have a winter coat on. Audrey had fun, she slept through the whole thing.

This year was a bit colder, by colder I mean it was about 25. Not exactly freezing, but not warm either. We bundled everybody up and headed out. Audrey had on two pairs of pants, a winter coat, hat, mittens, and I was wearing her so she had some heat from me. We thought this would be fine for a quick trip, we may have miscalculated. Live and learn.

We took the wagon ride out to the lot and chose pretty much the first tree we saw. We were not unaware of the fact that we had a baby with us. JT chopped that sucker down and we headed over to get it bundled, get some cider, and catch the wagon back.

 Everything was great until about halfway through the wagon ride.

Audrey started getting mad so I turned her around to my front so I could talk to her and warm her up. She was not interested. So I took her out of the carrier. Also not interested. We finished out the wagon ride with a fussy baby.

Honestly, we had not yet had an experience with not being able to calm her down when out in public. We really didn't know what else to do so she cried. I'm sure the other wagon riders just loved her.

I took her inside the warm shop to see Santa while JT paid. She was OK for a little bit but just as I tried to take a picture she lost it. I didn't want to make her sit there so we left.

And then baby girl absolutely lost her shit.

We sat in the car for at least 10 minutes trying to calm her down enough to leave. I tried nursing her, we turned the heat way up, we tried toys, books, everything. She was hysterical. And apparently cold. Elmo finally did the trick and we were on our way. Thank god for smart phones.

Next year snow pants and boots are mandatory. She has both of these things but we did not think to put them on her as there was no snow. Amateur hour, I know. Live and learn.

She seems to have warmed to the tree though. And really a family trip to cut down a tree would not be complete without tears, just ask any one of my siblings.

She got two ornaments this year. A penguin ball from us and a reindeer from grandma and grandpa.

You may also wonder if Audrey tries to play with the tree. The answer is no. How can this be? We bought a blue spruce. It is quite sharp. She will go over and touch it and look at us like "why is this so pokey."

Mean? Perhaps, but so far it has worked.

I can hardly wait to see what next year at the tree farm brings.