Last week’s ice storm blessed my siblings with an early release on Thursday and a snow day on Friday. I was thoroughly disappointed that the storm brought us a mere 2 or 3 inches of snow, when forecasters originally called for a foot. Instead we got a quarter inch of ice followed by a pathetic two inches of snow. So much for the first big snow storm of the year.
On Saturday, we decided to go get our Christmas tree. We always go chop down our own. Half the fun is picking it out and chopping it down and bringing it home. I was quite excited because there was actual snow on the ground this year. Usually we get the tree in the rain or mud.
However, we did not think about the fact that the ice had not yet melted. The ground was an ice rink. The trees were covered as well. We could not find a single tree that was not coated in a thick layer of ice. Eventually, we found a satisfactory tree and chopped it down. The thing was extremely heavy due to the amount of ice on it.
When we got home, we realized that if we put it in the house right away, it would melt all over the floor. So we set it up in the garage with a tiny space heater to try and melt the ice.

Unfortunately, the heater did not do much to decrease the ice on the tree. After a few hours, my dad just decided to bring it inside. The trunk was frozen solid and he had to use a hair dryer to warm it up in order to put it in the stand. He set it up and it wasn’t until it was inside that we realized exactly how much ice was left on the branches. We also realized that it was quite crooked. Of course, the ice immediately started melting into the carpet, which brought back fond memories of The Fish Tank Saga.


The carpet was quickly becoming saturated in water, which made my parents very glad they hadn’t replaced it along with the upstairs carpet over the summer. They also worried if this would cause them to have to replace the carpet after Christmas.
My sister and I began to pull ice off of the tree while my bro used the shop vac to suck the water out of the carpet. We also vacuumed the actual tree, which was hysterical. We spent about an hour doing that and it helped. We pulled a bucket and a half of ice off of the tree, which was most of the ice.
After that, the tree was still wet so we could put the lights on and decorate it. My dad decided to let it sit in the kitchen all night to dry and completely thaw out, while the family room carpet dried.

After all that work, we were able to decorate it Sunday night. It’s smaller than most of the trees we get, so it’s quite crammed with ornaments and we had a lot leftover, which we put on a fake tree in the basement. Here’s the formerly frozen tree in all its decorated glory. It’s still not straight, either.

Notice the lack of ornaments on the lower branches. That’s because of our resident Mischief Maker.
Filed under: Holidays, Photos, the humor of life | 6 Comments »