Everyone in the family has a handmade Christmas stocking and they are all different. Dear Husband and I each have two stockings as we still have the stockings from our childhood. In random years the children would also hang stockings for various pets but this year our two-and four-footed friends got nothing. No treats, no coal, not even any snowman poop! Santa seems to have forgotten our Kona, Artemis, Nani Moana, and Kukuna. But on our last trip to the pet store we spent a small fortune on their food so I think they should just be thankful they still reside with us where life is easy, warm, and they have no chores.
Six family members. We don't have many opportunities for a "whole family photo" so I like to take advantage of any occasion when we are all gathered. We have a wide age-range with our children, spreading out over 18 years by birth and adoption. This photo is from a family reunion in Steamboat Springs andy we all made it! So, here are Middle Daughter, Youngest Daughter, Oldest Daughter, and Only Son with their parents.
On a side note, we are having problems with high winds and mountain lions this morning. Two headlines in this morning's paper:
Mountain lion snatches Boulder terrier
Hold on tight: High winds pound Boulder
With gusts this morning topping 70 MPH, I'm going to be watching out for the mountain lions being blown around our city today. That would be REALLY frightening!
Wow, what an exciting election for our country! This was the first election Dear Husband and I were politically active -- other than voting, which we always do but in the past we generally cancelled out each other's votes. This time we actually had a seriously pro-life candidate who is intelligent and such a peaceful man -- and both of us supported him whole-heartedly throughout the election and look forward to a wonderful future for the US . Yeah!!
Three Christmas Peace Doves. I made these for friends this Christmas. I love the fabric -- and the tags came out nicely as well. Just three weeks before President Obama is sworn in -- I feel peace is on the way!
AND two daughters assembling their dad's Christmas gift!
I remember a time, seems like just yesterday, when Dear Husband and I would stay up late on Christmas Eve, after the children had gone to sleep, to put the gifts under the tree. Occasionally we had bought something that needed assembling and we would pull our hair out trying to get it together-- while being SO TIRED. Ultimately everything was finished, looking quite beautiful under the tree and about an hour or two later the little ones would be tapping on our arms whispering, "Mommy, Daddy, Santa came!" The look of wonder in their eyes made it all worth while.
They still believe in Santa because they know that if they don't, they'll get underwear for Christmas. But now they are old enough to put their own toys together -- and to put daddy's toys together as well! Youngest Daughter and Middle Daughter spent a couple hours assembling Dear Husband's Wii and then we all played it the rest of the day. What fun! And we worked off some of the ham and chocolate candies. Of course, this morning I can just barely type as my shoulder is sore from so much Wii Bowling! We also heard Youngest Daughter say that she was considering transferring to a college closer to home now so she'd have access to her dad's Christmas gift!
And now -- a song we used to sing at Christmas Eve mass. It's so beautiful!
Apparently, this cookie was baked and decorated by my late mother-in-law in about 1967. It even survived the move from Dallas to Washington a few years ago. My father-in-law showed it to my daughters last winter when they visited with him up in Washington. Daughters were quite impressed with their grandmother's decorating skills as they had no idea that one could decorate home-baked cookies. They had never seen anything like it in their own home! I, of course, was wondering why anyone would save a cookie for that long a time but then -- how could you throw it out now?
UPDATE: Father-in-law sent this email after reading this blog entry. So-- now we have the rest of the story as Paul Harvey says:
The Christmas cookie was one that Jo had given to Uncle Bill when they lived on Bonita Street in Dallas. Bill was never one to throw anything out. So when Gertrude was preparing to move to Boyd, Texas I helped her boxing things. So when I came across the cookie, my sis said she would give it to me, if I promised to keep it. So that is why I still have it. So when I move on someone else will have to decide what to do with it. On TV the other day they were showing a Fruit cake that was almost one hundred years old.
