The Gestabull of Trees

Natalee has what doctors call a little bit of a speech problem. So, that's how she'd pronounce Festival of Trees, which is where we went earlier this evening. This is one of our favorite family traditions, but this year we had to do it without Dad. We missed his anxiety at the parking and the crowds, but he was with us in spirit. We drug MarKey, Bennett, Nia and Madeline along with us and made it an (almost) girls night out. It was a blast and Natalee had such a good time. She'd have had a better time had I actually allowed her to touch everything, but a good time nonetheless.

This was Natalee's favorite tree. It was all Disney and stuffed full of characters, games, dolls and other paraphanalia. Madeline kept pointing and saying "Toby" which is her favorite Thomas character. There was no Toby on the tree, but we humored her. Also, want to know my favorite thing? That Natalee has learned to "pose" for pictures like an obnoxious 6 year old instead of just standing and smiling. YIPPEE! Just in time for Christmas!

This was the most unusual tree. It's made of golf clubs with a tee and ball on the top. Who makes these things? It also had a funny name: Teed Off At Christmas. I think they meant for it to be a like Teeing Off in golf, but if you're T'd off I think that means you're mad about something, so maybe they meant that they are angry with Christmas. Either way, very unique.

This was the coolest tree and the photo doesn't do it justice. It was all blown glass with lights inside to illuminate the whole thing. It came with 6 additional trees that all had blown glass ornaments. So cool! I really wanted to know how much it went for, but the "guard" of the tree wouldn't tell us and I didn't make it to the booth. And while we were there a guy tried to break it by thumping it with his finger. I don't think he realized it was glass....or maybe he's just destructive and stupid. (My sister MarKey said something about him that I won't repeat, this is a family blog and I'd like to keep it PG rated.)

After we looked at the trees we took the kids to watch some little dancers. They just grooved along to the music, and I must say I busted out a few moves of my own. Then we took them to the kiddie area where Natalee got a "manicure", painted a Christmas ornament (yeah, a new memory!) and got a balloon animal. Madeline did a little Santa craft and got a cool wand that Bennett played with the rest of the night.

As we were leaving Natalee said, "It's been a wonderful day! A wonderful day! I got my nails painted and painted an ornament and saw all the trees and now we are going to Sweet Tomatoes!" And that's what we did. So fun, all of it, so fun!