They paved paradise and put up a parking lot...

Yes, Tom Perring's Christmas tree farm on Chicago Ave. is now a thing of the past. A couple of years ago, Prof. Perring (Entomology at UCR) told us that he was putting the farm on the market. It took a while to sell as the lot mostly can't be developed. Then a church bought it, and they're planning to put a parking lot there eventually. In the meantime, someone else is leasing the land and selling off the remaining trees on the weekends leading up to Christmas.

It was a wonderful place to pick up a local pine and have some hot cider while the kids hung out in the playhouse (better built than some of the houses I've been seeing on the market lately). Perring's grad students would help out, his dogs would loll near the tire swing, and it was a great time.

I'm hesitant, actually, to take our little girl to pick out a tree there this year as she won't understand the changes. I'm debating trying some of the other Christmas tree fars that are further out. There's one in Perris on Wood Rd. that I've driven past, and there's supposed to be one in Reche Canyon in Colton. We'll see...

To find a Christmas tree farm near you and other "pick your own" types of farms, a nice site is:
http://www.pickyourown.org/index.htm
Their page on Riverside is:
http://www.pickyourownchristmastree.org/CAxmasriver.php