Exciting Times in Port Jervis

So the Murphy Family Band Geeks have had a busy weekend. First, Keith and the kids played at the Kmart Salvation Army kettle for 2 hours and froze their toes. Then later that evening we had a Tree Lighting in downtown Port Jervis that the Broome Street Marching Band played Christmas music for. I was amazed at how many people came. I guess there is not much to do in a small town because there were a lot of people there. The salvation Army was there with free hot chocolate and cookies. They are even having a light decorating contest and then they will drive the Senior Citizens around to see all the houses. When Santa and Mrs. Clause arrived I swear Buddy the elf was there too. We usually cut down our Christmas tree every year but due to time constraints we bought ours at a little nursery in Port Jervis. We found our tree, a Blue Spruce that only cost us $25, after Keith and the Tree guy held up almost every tree on the lot for us to look at. We have a silly tradition that started after we watched Vern saves Christmas one year. Vern would sing the song O Christmas tree and he only knew that one line so he sings the whole song with just that one line. When we find the tree that we are going to bring home we stand around it and sing O Christmas Tree like Vern did on the movie. Now you have to remember that our kids are with us and we are singing in public, you would think that they would be embarrassed. but sometimes they are the ones reminding us that we have to sing. This year the tree guy joined in. We decided that we would decorate Sunday after church. That ended up being pretty late on Sunday evening and we had to move every piece of furniture at least 3 times before we found just the right spot. We started to put the lights on the tree and found that we needed more strands of lights so the decorating would have to wait until Monday evening. On Maonday the band played again at another tree lighting in Port Jervis and more free hot chocolate and cookies. They even let me play the Jingle Bells. The top of our tree is a little sparse with lights but we have 1,000 lights on this tree so any more will have to wait until next year. I even made ginger bread cookies for our tree. Danny and Keith were in charge of the tinsel and you can see by the pictures what a great job they did!!! We have another tradition that I don't really care for and pretty much happens by accident and that is our tree falls down after it is fully decorated. This year we were lucky and were able to catch it before it hit the floor so only one smashed ornament this year (This is the reason I made cookie ornaments). Well our tree is all decorated and looks beautiful and the tree lights keep going out because there are too many. Oh well. I tried.