Bagging a Christmas tree

Padre Mickey yesterday set a pretty high bar in testing our mettle in his posting about putting up his artificial Christmas tree, but I am going to take up the challenge and show you all how we do it in Vermont.

It would seem that Compa's and my modus operandi is always to do something important at dusk, whether it's coming down from Mount Washington (in the pitch dark three years ago), or Mount Madison (not only dark but in rain) or Mount Adams (again, pushing darkness). Why shouldn't we go chop down our Christmas tree except as our eight-hour fifty-some-odd minute day is ending? Not only that, but we do it in the snow on snowshoes.

So... since it was dusk, the photos will be blurry, dark or crazy with a flash. The big snowflakes add to the ambiance.


Here is Compa scouting out a possible tree. She has already paid the $20 to the people down the road who run this tree farm.


There are so many trees from which to choose but we have to be careful not to get too tall a tree or it won't fit in our shoebox house.


We settle on this one. I stay by it while Compa gets the car and chainsaw.


Before chopping it down (usually with a bow saw), we have to get the snow off the branches so I do that.


Then the tree is felled. It takes two seconds to get it to come down. Not every tree is that compliant.


Likewise the chainsaw doesn't bind itself in the tree. Thank God for small mercies.


We then drag it to the car (a Honda CRV), hoist it up on top and tie it with a rope that I can hold from within the car.


Finally, the tree is unceremoniously dumped on the garage floor to wait coming inside.

Later, you'll get a photo of the tree in its place and fully decorated. But not until next week.

So, there you be. A bagged tree.