Creating family memories
Giggling and jostling, donning hats, gloves and jackets, children run and dance around their parents as they scamper up and down the rows evergreens. The pungent aroma of the trees fills the air. Christmas music wafts through the cold December air.
Walking through the straight green rows of pines, firs and cypress, visitors to Wonderland Christmas Tree Farm have myriad choices for the perfect tree to take home. Interspersed with the mature, harvest-able trees are seedlings just waiting their turn to find a home.
Open now for the fifth year in the rural setting, just minutes from town, Martin and Jill Babb turned a hobby into a business and this year, Martin retired from shipping to join the family fulltime on the venture, a business they moved from Omaha, Ark., when they moved to Pea Ridge in 2009. Martin was a ship captain and his work took him away for weeks at a time. Growing the trees began as a hobby and flourished as Babb continued to educate himself on the trees. He experiments with different species and plants as many as 3,000 2-year-old seedlings every year.
“I started trying to grow trees,” Martin said, adding that he eventually “figured it out.”
“It’s in him,” Jill said of Martin. “He just loves trees.”
The Babbs said they want to provide a fun, wholesome family experience for Christmas on the 38 acres of Christmas trees ready for new homes. They have carefully orchestrated the experience for their customers, providing Christmas music playing over outside speakers and a hayride to transport customers into the fields to find their perfect tree. There are tree carts to carry the trees out of the field.
Trees to buy start at 5 to 6 feet with prices begin at $45.99 for the shorter trees. Fraser fir, shipped in, range from 7 to 14 feet tall. Lanes of “marketable trees” are marked with colored price tags. Species available include Scotch Pine, Virginia Pine, White Pine, Leyland Cypress, and, in 2021, Turkish Fir. Each tree has its unique characteristic. Some are aromatic, some have long needles, some have short. The Leyland is reportedly good for allergy sufferers.
“I just love the Fraser,” Jill Babb exclaimed bragging on its strong branches and soft needles. She said the experience of cutting a tree is appealing to families with small children and the Fraser doesn’t grow well in Arkansas. The Fraser shipped in by the Babbs comes from North Carolina and the trees are well hydrated.
In fact, thanks to a very wet spring, all the trees are well hydrated and heavier than usual, she said. The wet weather bolstered the trees and even caused Martin to shear the trees four times instead of three.
The farm offers bow saws and carts to aid in the tree cutting and transporting process.
“We have everything except the gloves,” Martin said. He made the tree carts by cutting and welding deer carts for customers to carry the trees out of the fields.
Customers take the trees back to the shed area and their trees are placed in corrals, then in the “tree shaker” to remove dead needles. The tree is bagged and placed on the customers’ cars or in trucks by employees, many of whom are students in Pea Ridge.
Nearby is a gift shop on the front porch of which is a Santa letter box and wooden soldiers. Inside there are smiling faces of customers and employees as they look over the ornaments, Christmas cookies, wreaths, Christmas outfits for children and assorted gifts for sale.
Treats are available from several food vendors including The Sugar Shack, Aunt Susie’s Gourmet Kettle Popcorn and Last Drop Coffee.
The Babbs have been married 38 years and have four grown children and 16 grandchildren, many of whom work on the farm with them.
The farm was named in the 21 best Christmas Tree farms for the perfect family outing in Country Living magazine and one of the Top 10 Christmas tree farms in Arkansas in 2019 by Best Things Arkansas.