Makeshift Christmas Tree Stand

Where we live you can go to the Forest Service office and pick up a free permit to go cut down a Pinon tree for Christmas. We were all over that for a few reasons:

1. The word "FREE!"

2. Real Christmas trees are just better.

3. We've never had a real Christmas tree since getting married.

4. It gave us the chance to have an adventure.

So we got our permit, Cameron's trusty hand saw, and we took off in our awesome Geo to find the perfect tree. The road was muddy and icy and full of people in trucks getting their tree, but we knew if we kept going further up the mountain we'd get out of the crowd and find a better tree anyway. It was fun to float right by all the guys in their big trucks...our Geo is a trooper. Anyway, we found the perfect tree (8'4"), cut it down and tied it to the top of our car. On the way home we got some awesome looks from dudes in their trucks...they were just jealous that our little car could do just as good as their big truck. ;) 

 On the way home we realized we had forgotten to get a Christmas tree stand and we weren't really able to go buy one that day (it was Sunday and we try not to buy things on Sundays, and the closest store was 1/2 an hour away and we didn't want to drive an hour round trip just for a tree stand anyway), so we decided to get creative and see what we could come up with at home. We tried a few things that didn't work, but then as I was standing on our porch I saw the wood planters (which nothing grew in...frustration in the spring, but perfect now when we need it to not have plants in it). I grabbed one wood pot, a No. 10 tin can (from canning food), a bunch of bricks from our fire ring, and a bowl of gravel from our driveway. I put the tin can in the wood put and filled the space between with bricks. We then put a brick in the tin can and put the tree in. It still was too wobbly, so while I held the tree straight, Cameron filled the tin can with gravel. Then we topped it all with more bricks to hide the can and the gravel. To put the last touch on it I tied a red ribbon around the pot. And Voila! We love how it looks!