Oh Christmas tree
Logan Reitmeyer of West Alexander helps bale a Christmas tree at Candle Tree Farm. After people pick out their tree, workers will shake out loose needles and bale the tree for an easy trip home.
A tractor with a wagon attached drives around Candle Tree Farm to drop off passengers at different tree sections and pick up those who have found their trees. Candle Tree Farm has a variety of trees, including Scotch pine, white pine, blue spruce, Douglas fir, Canaan fir, Concolor fir and Fraser fir.
Nicole Robison, John Chmill and Mason Grilli, 7, check out the selection of Fraser firs at Candle Tree Farm.
John Chmill, Mason Grilli, 7, and Nicole Robison of Peters Township carry out their Fraser fir Christmas tree from Candle Tree Farm.
Some families have forged a lasting tradition each December by toting a bow saw into the wilderness to cut down their own Christmas tree for the holidays.
People who sawed at the trunk of a Douglas fir as children – under the close supervision of their parents, of course – often come back years later to the same tree farms that dot Washington and Greene counties to share similar memories with their own kids.
But the family roots of this tradition go much deeper than the customers. For the owners of the few tree farms remaining in this area, the tradition is family oriented and stretches multiple generations.
Autumn Marisa Lexer, who along with her four brothers, Kurt, Kent, Kameron and Kerry, purchased Kent’s Tree Farm in Spraggs nearly a decade ago and have been holding their own weekend sales ever since. Lexer now lives in suburban Philadelphia, but she and her brothers return to the farm each weekend during December to help with the sales.
“It’s a family affair,” Lexer said. “For our family, it’s something we found that we all enjoy doing. It’s a labor of love. It’s a lot of work for the weekend of the sales, but it feels so good to give something where the families come out and love it.”
The Marisas purchased the farm from Wesley Kent, who still lives on the property and helps maintain it throughout the year. Some of the brothers live far away on the East Coast, although Kent Marisa moved back to Greene County recently, but they all gather during the spring to help plant new saplings. Their parents, Jackie and Rudy Marisa, drive to a farm in Ohio to purchase more than a thousand saplings that are then placed in the ground to replenish the fields from the previous Christmas sale.
The time together gives the family – which now includes another generation of 14 grandchildren, including Lexer’s new baby boy – an opportunity to reunite and share stories while they tend to the trees.
“It’s just become a tradition for us. We look forward to it every year,” she said of the sales. “Everybody is working so hard, but then when it’s over, we can’t wait until next year.”
Families come from all over, including Ohio, Pittsburgh and Latrobe, to buy their trees, Lexer said. Their enjoyment of the rural farm in southern Greene County, however, is only part of the happiness the Marisa family receives.
“They’re so happy we have a place like this,” Lexer said of return customers. “It’s about doing something to build a tradition for their families, and really it’s become a tradition for our family.”
That’s how Kathy Leavitt views Candle Tree Farm, which she owns and manages just off the Taylorstown exit of Interstate 70, about seven miles west of Washington.
She and her husband, Bruce, bought the former dairy farm on 96 acres in Buffalo Township in 1985 and began planting trees the following year. They battled a trio of foes – deer, insects and disease – and it took more than a decade for the first saplings to mature into Christmas trees, Leavitt said.
“We didn’t know a thing about farming or a thing about Christmas trees,” she said.
They cut back on their planting about 10 years ago when she and Bruce were thinking more about retirement, but their son, Greg, then showed a sudden interest in continuing the family legacy.
“Oh, geez. The trees we could’ve had,” Leavitt said. “We’re still a little behind the eight ball on that.”
They now plant 4,000 trees a year to replenish the farm and to keep the business running. Bruce died two years ago, leaving Kathy wondering if she would be able to keep up with busy task of the farm. Her son and his wife, Amanda, have helped in recent years.
“We put (Greg) on the tractor and he liked it so much he wanted to continue doing it,” Kathy said. “Without them, maybe I wouldn’t have kept it up. With them, we’re continuing to plant and be here for the next generation. I’ve always loved it.”
The family plants in the spring and prunes during the year – “They don’t grow into Christmas tree shapes by themselves,” Kathy said – before they’re hit by the nonstop rush of customers in December, when they’re open seven days a week.
“Then in January, we collapse,” she said.
Many customers return year after year. Kathy, who began keeping a ledger of customers “just for fun” in the mid-1990s, is now seeing people who came as children and are returning with families of their own.
“We found, often times, young families come and then the kids grow up, but we won’t see that family for many years. And then they’re back with grandkids or the kids now have children of their home,” she said.
“It’s definitely geared toward families and young children.”