Oh Christmas Tree (and Lights)

The weekend after we got home from Illinois, we headed out to get our Christmas tree. We went to a local tree farm and wandered quite a ways to find just the right one. Jackie wasn't really sure what was going on, but he liked being outside and agreed that the tree we picked out was a "nice one."He wandered off while Rach did the hard part of sawing it down, but as soon as that tree toppled over, Jackie's interest was piqued.He "helped" us carry it back to the car and got pretty excited when we put it in the trunk to take it home. He got even more excited when he realized we were taking the tree into the house. He wanted to help with every part of the process. He even got into the act by "helping" to adjust the tree stand. As you can see, he's got his screwdriver ready just in case.

When it was time to decorate, our friends Emily, Todd, Etta, and Mo came over to help. This has become a tradition with us (we celebrated Hanukkah with them). Here's Jackie and Etta, posing with the first two ornaments they put on. They then proceeded to hang every other ornament on those exact same branches. Thankfully Susie was there to rearrange them as needed.

Jackson and Etta did most of the decorating, but Susie, having a slight height advantage, did the honor of topping off the tree with our angel. I think they did a lovely job, don't you?

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Once the inside lights were up it was time to move to the outside of the house. Jackson carried on his "big helper" attributes by stringing some of the lights in our front bushes.

The mommies (namely Susie) did the higher up lights-and-ladder work, while our neighbor Helen helped by keeping an eye on Jackson for us. Jackie boy was not to be outdone though. As soon as Mom was off the ladder, he scrambled right up the second from the top step before realizing maybe he needed to wait another year before he tackled that job.

It was really fun to see Jackson get so involved in the holiday preparations. This Christmas was really shaping up to be fun for the whole family.