How do you plant an orange tree?

As a current orange tree owner, I feel a great responsibility to share with all of my friends in online land about my experience. This way, you can repeat it yourself whenever you're ready to own your own orange tree.
1. Search high and low around the East Valley for an orange tree and then assume you missed them and that they are all sold out.
2. Go to Costco for laundry detergent and happen upon them! Pick one up immediately.
3. Drive home carefully (you don't want it to tip in the back of the truck).
4. Keep it shaded and watered until rain comes so you can actually get a shovel in the dirt you call your backyard. (For those of you in Arizona, this step could take the longest. Good luck!)
5. Once rain comes, go to Lowes to purchase the necessary nutrients. (Jason was responsible for this step, so ask him about it if you have questions.)
6. Dig a hole 2-3 times the size of the bucket in the moist dirt (from the rain, remember?). [This step REQUIRES a big strong man. If you do not feel that your man is strong enough at this point in time, do not worry. Simply have him start a rigorous bench pressing workout now, and by next January you should be good to go.] Use a dolly to bring tree to back yard.

7. Have wife hold tree while you feel the hole with fertilizer until it is at the right height. (My grandfather told me that your root ball should be above the ground. What is a root ball? I still don't know, but Jason did and said ours was.)

8. Fill hole around tree alternating between dirt and fertilizer. Mix occasionally. Don't worry about the mixing too much because as you water the tree the dirts will mix anyway (or so Jason says). Also pat down to remove any air pockets.


9. Create a basin for the water to sit in when you water. If you do not follow this step correctly it'll be like (and I quote my grandfather word for word) "You are wasting your time. That water needs to sit there!"

10. Water daily. But do not overwater (how much more ambiguous could that be? water, but not too much. How am I supposed to know what is too much? I'm not an orange tree, I've never been an orange tree.) So, good luck with the watering.
11. Deal with whining dog who doesn't want to share what she feels is "her backyard" with a tree. Take both dogs inside and keep an eye on it so she doesn't dig it up.

12. Enjoy fruit in 3-5 years (that's our estimate, we'll let you know how accurate it is.)