I grew up in Quincy, IL and when you reach the 4th grade, on Arbor Day, each child is presented with a tree to take home and plant in their family's yard.

Although you would not see this very often anymore in the Chicago suburbs, I grew up with two apple trees in the parkway of my childhood home.

Buying our new home was as exciting as can be, and with that new home came the gift of a tree.

The memories are under the trees, split and open to the air like the fruit that fell from their branches every year.

While growing up, Christmas in my family, no matter how old I was, always entailed a night service at church, a ride home from church in the car with the whole family singing hymns, and sipping hot

My aunt used to visit annually at Christmas, and she, my mother, my sister, and I would pile up in our Ford Fairlane station wagon and cruise the streets at night during her visit in search of Chri

I AM A MAPLE TREE. 

There is a tree on the parkway next to our three-season farmer's market here in Oak Park that means a lot to our family.

When I was five years old, my grandpa and I got a little twig in a paper cup from McDonald's on Earth Day.

For as long as I can remember, trees have been part of my life. As a child, I had countless hours climbing into the nearest tree, and staying there for hours.

"What is my path? How am I ever going to find it?"

The cornerstone of every successful childhood is a really amazing tree. For me, growing up in Naperville, it was the weeping willow across the yards behind my house.

     I grew up in Norwood Park on Chicago's Northwest side. We lived three houses down from the Park District. Close to the fieldhouse was a clump of smaller trees.

My husband and I bought our first home in 2004.  It's in Chicago city limits, so we're surrounded by the very typical hustle and bustle of busy street noises, trains speeding by (or qu

“I think that I shall never see

a poem as lovely as a tree...”

Joyce Kilmer

Many years ago when I was a child growing up in Detroit, all of our family pictures were taken in front of the enormous oak tree in our backyard.

Our white ash tree stands tall, strong and solitary in our backyard in a neighborhood otherwise devoid of ash trees, devastated by the emerald ash borer and drastic removal initiatives.

My childhood home is in a southwest neighborhood of Chicago. I lived there for 23 years.

I had worked several years at a behavioral health hospital on a residential unit, with some amazing physicians. However, Dr.