OMG, Christmas Tree.

The Christmas cuteness is abundant at my house. I've been sitting on this post for almost a week because the funniness quotes are being slung at me with sling shots. I'm about to buckle under the burden of the sweetness of Hanni & Yusef's first Christmas....

My kids are Muslim, and I am very careful to uphold their families' individual religious practices for them. But I really wanted a Christmas tree, therefore, we are celebrating a non-religious, Santa Claus based, Christmas in the Casey household.

I loooooveee me some Christmas trees. I name them, talk to them, stroke them, kiss on them, thank them for coming into my life.  (Turn on warm, twinkly lights and turn down the room lighting and you have the exact recipe for every party I've ever thrown.) I BELIEVE in the Christmas tree.

Money is tight. Going from single woman to single mother of two very hungry teenage boys has meant a vast difference in budgetary capabilities. I heard from a friend that the trees are cheapest in Queens, so I organized a much publicized four hour window in the kids' busy calendar to go buy ourselves some Christmas cheer.

I tried to get them excited about the tree for an entire week, when that wasn't working, I invited our beloved and highly cheerful friend Rose to come with us. Sunday came along, and we loaded two grumbling teenagers into the big car, and this is what I had to listen to alllll the way to Sunnyside:

Yusef: Why are we going to Queens?
Hanni: Why would we pay money for a Christmas tree now when we could just get one on the street after everyone throws them out?
Yusef: I didn't know we were going all the way to Queens.
Hanni: Maybe we could rent a tree. We should rent a tree.
Yusef: Ms. do you know where you're going? Gawd.
Hanni: How much is this tree going to cost us? We could just go to a forest and cut one.

I reacted as any calm and graceful woman would--I took the kid's phone that was closest to me and threw it across the car, plugged in my iPod and turned up the Christmas music. I mean, I recognize everything they were saying was funny, but I wanted family bonding cheer time. And enforced fun always goes well.

The tree picking out went reasonably well. A sweet French Canadian responded well to my bargaining for a seven foot beauty. I made the children meet the tree, Yusef kept his hood up and gave me 'the look' that I think he believes can inspire fear, Hani told me if I had worked harder, I could have gotten the tree man down to $10.

Rose was starting to look a little like she couldn't figure out why she was in Queens with two teenagers and a crazed mom, so we took a break and left the kids to figure out tying the tree to the top of the car. We could hear them cursing at each other in Arabic and Mandingo all the way into the Rite Aid across the parking lot. I knew they'd figure it out.

The boys were laughing by the time we got back to the car, and the ride back consisted of Christmas music and even more laughter. Poor Rose had to hold the tree through the sunroof in order to prevent it whipping off the car and onto the BQE.

Is Santa real?
Is he the snowman?
Oh my god. We have to stop putting stuff on the tree it's going to be so ugly. Merry Christmas! Merry Christmas!
Miss, Christmas music is nice.
Ousmane sitting on floor under tree, I'm going to take all of Walid's presents. He's going to have nothing.
Walid so sweetly into decorating and making the tree beautiful.
Liz holding the tree out the sunroof. The wide berth given to me on the BQE.
The Grinch scared Ousmane.
Cars made walid happy. The sweetness was back. The boys yelling at each other while tying the tree down.
Baby, it's freezing out there.
Standing in the street looking up at our tree.
Cathy, who's going to give US presents.
I'm not getting anyone anything.

We should say goodbye to her now.

We should put her in storage.