Night Tree

FG
by Fourth Grade14 views·Updated Nov 30, 2023
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  1. Hey, fun families.
  2. I'm here with Night Tree by Eve Bunting so that
  3. we can do our family stem challenge for December,
  4. which is about making animal feeders for the animals to get through the winter.
  5. And again, this book is Night Tree by Eve Bunting. Illustrated by Ted
  6. Rand.
  7. On the night before Christmas, we always go to find our tree.
  8. We bundle up so we're warm. Nina is already wearing her boots that are too big for her.
  9. She's been wearing them all day.
  10. Dad sets our box in the back of the truck with the rest
  11. of his stuff and the four of us squish into the front seat.
  12. We drive through the bright Christmas streets to where the dark and quiet began.
  13. Nina is almost asleep in mom's lap when we stop.
  14. Are we there?
  15. I ask? And dad says yes and rolls down the window so we can smell the tree smell.
  16. We scramble out
  17. there are oaks growing here in alder and maples that are bare.
  18. Now in the white moonshine,
  19. the pines and the spruces and the firs are green.
  20. This is called Luke's Forest,
  21. but dad says it's not really a forest just a nice forgotten place where our town ends.
  22. Dad goes first on the path between the trees,
  23. carrying our box and the big red lantern.
  24. Mom and Nina go next, holding hands.
  25. I come last with the blanket.
  26. It hasn't snowed yet.
  27. It's so cold. My breath hurts.
  28. The sky is spattered with stars and the moon big as
  29. a basketball slides in and out between the tree tops.
  30. Dad's lantern sweeps ahead.
  31. Look, he whispers,
  32. we stop. A deer is watching us.
  33. I see the brightness of its eyes. Then it turns and it's gone.
  34. Here's our tree. Dad says
  35. it has been our tree forever and ever
  36. we walk around it touching it.
  37. It's grown since last year. I say
  38. mom puts her hand on my shoulder. So have you?
  39. So have I, Nina says,
  40. Nina hates to be left out
  41. and owl hoots deep in the darkness. There are secrets all around us.
  42. Can I put on the popcorn chain? Nina asks,
  43. she hops up and down right out of one of her boots.
  44. Mom helps her get it back on.
  45. Nina takes one end of the chain and I take the other
  46. and we wind it around our tree.
  47. We've brought apples and tangerines with strings on them.
  48. Then we hang them from the branches.
  49. It's hard to hang string loops when you have gloves on,
  50. but it's too cold to take them off
  51. for weeks. We've been making balls of sunflower seeds and pressed millet and honey.
  52. We hang those two.
  53. We scattered shelled nuts and bread crumbs and pieces of apple
  54. underneath for the little creatures who can't climb very well.
  55. Our tree looks so pretty.
  56. Mom says I should spread the blanket so we can sit and admire our tree.
  57. She has brought a thermos of hot chocolate.
  58. I take off my gloves and toast my hands around my warm cup.
  59. Dad turns off the lantern and we stay quiet
  60. hoping some of the little animals will come back while we're there,
  61. hoping the deer will come back.
  62. But it doesn't.
  63. It's shy. Dad says
  64. I'm shy too. Nina tells him
  65. before we leave. She and I get to choose a Christmas carol to sing.
  66. I chose, oh, come all ye faithful.
  67. Nina chooses
  68. old Macdonald had a farm.
  69. That's not a Christmas song silly. I tell her.
  70. But mom says it's a fine and very nice song too.
  71. We sing fast because there are lots of verses and it's getting colder.
  72. After the last eio we gather up our things and head for the truck.
  73. I look back once
  74. our tree has folded itself into the darkness, but I think I can still see it.
  75. Stars caught in on its branches and the moon swinging lopsided on top.
  76. Nina gets tired and dad has to wrap her in the blanket and carry her.
  77. I carry her boots
  78. later in bed.
  79. I think about our tree.
  80. And sometimes
  81. next day when the aunts and uncles and the cousins
  82. are at our house and it's noisy and happy.
  83. I let my mind go back to Luke's Forest.
  84. I think of the birds having Christmas dinner and the
  85. squirrels and the possums and the raccoons and the skunks.
  86. There might even be a bear because dad says bears don't really sleep all winter.
  87. And if one's going to wake up, I just bet it would wake up for Christmas.
  88. Maybe a fox has come
  89. stepping high on its thin sharp paws and they're all
  90. there together singing their own Christmas songs on Christmas Day
  91. around our tree.
  92. The end.
  93. All right. I hope that you have liked that story.
  94. If you would like to make an animal feeder with your family and bring it to school,
  95. you can,
  96. um, but we also can take those on social media if you wanted to post them on X,
  97. which is the new Twitter you can do.
  98. Um, hashtag Von Family
  99. Stem.
  100. All right. Have a great weekend. We'll see you soon.