Christmas Eve

Today, we are off to visit extended family in a cottage they are renting for a week, just an hour south of us. Cancelled due to weather and health on both sides. This is the AI summary of the morning conflab* on FB  

For the sake of the blog, however, it is time to catch up with Christmas doings. We all prepare for so long, but then it is over in a flash. Today, I take you back to Christmas Eve, which we hosted for, I think, the first time since we moved here.

We only graze on Christmas morning before we all disperse by noon, but we have a meal on the Eve. This year it was Mexican Lasagna. In this first photo, Sha and Dani were at the stove about to serve themselves before heading to the table.

It was apple pie for dessert, served from my mother's ancient silver, pie plate holder.

There were post-dinner games at the table: Tiddly Winks in the first picture, Wizard in the second. I think JJ won at Tiddly, and I know that Dani won at Wizard because she noted such very clearly on the scoresheet which we will keep. 

The kids enjoyed hot chocolate.

Sue revived the Christmas Journal in which everyone leaves a note. The practice stopped with COVID, but it was time to revive it, especially since we were here for Christmas Eve and Sue recently came across the book again.

It was a very nice Christmas Eve. On this occasion we didn’t need to bundle up and drive home in a cold car that would barely have a chance to heat before we arrived. 

* Spellcheck doesn’t like conflab, but it is in the Dictionary: “noun INFORMAL an informal private conversation or discussion.”

Boxes that Delight

Boxing Day for humans must be Merry Catmas Day for the kitties.

Speaking of boxes, Jonathan couldn’t have been more pleased after opening one yesterday. It contained a Skittles dispenser, and JJ does love his Skittles. He just has to hold his and under the device, and a Skittle will drop out. What more could a boy want?

Christmas Cards

I know you are all busy with family festivities today, but through the miracle of setting a time to publish, I can still get my cards and wishes out there even as I am presently visiting the kid and opening gifts with them. The timing feels right to me, even though this post may not be seen by many.

We have two cards for you today, but you have already seen both base photos without the added text.

Why two cards, you may ask. Well because after I prepared the first, I had the urge not the waste the second image that came my way. I've told the story of the second image previously, so I shan't repeat myself. What I will say, is that I have embraced the Happy Christmas variation more and more because that is what I hear on all of the British telly that I watch. After Happy sounding odd at first, it now seems very right.

However, I would hate to eschew the good ole North American, Merry, so here we are.

If you actually get here on Christmas Day, I hope you are having a good one. If you happen to drop by later, I hope you had a good Christmas.

The Eve is Upon Us

The Eve is upon us. The 23rd involved some last-minute preps, including cooking the Mexican Lasagna that we will share with our little family tonight. I had to drop some parcels off at the kids' for Christmas Day tomorrow and asked if they wanted my to bring them any goodies from Tims. 

Danica: Omg yas. Can I have an iced Capp please 

Jonathan: can i have a chocolate dip donut perchance and a lemonade

It proceeded to snow for most of the day. We had a photo in mind downtown in the evening, but we weren't keen to take the car out with the roads not yet being plowed. So, we just took a little evening walk up and down the street. In keeping with the spirit of the season, I photographed a few of the lighted houses.

One house has a moving display, so I took a short video clip. There was accompanying music that the phone did not pick up well.

Happy Christmas Eve to you.

A Bit of Winter Driving

Yesterday, JJ asked for a drive into work for an 11 o'clock shift. I had some grocery shopping to do, and Sue had some other shopping to attend to, so we all headed out. There's nothing exciting about that, but I thought that I would share this photo of the drive from his house toward the store: just a typical winter day in Eastern Ontario. It was just a light snow, and we can deal with it. We have to deal with it.

To drive to our downtown, I would turn left at the lights, but we were going straight ahead to the next lights which are maybe a half mile ahead where we would turn left to JJ's work. If one didn't turn there, they would find themselves leaving our modest town, after which traffic would flow freely and not too heavily for quite a while before getting closer to Ottawa.

I dropped JJ at his grocery store, then drove Sue over to Winners before driving back to the grocery store. I had told Jonathan that it would be nice to have him help check me out and use his employee discount, but it was not to be. It was crowded in there and the boy was in great demand.

After sadly paying full price and then loading my car, JJ appeared in front of me, helping to load a lady's purchase. All is not lost when you can get a photo of your grandson.

I picked up Sue and we drove home and put the car in the garage for the day and for the night. It is snowing again this morning, and I think we'll have more snow than yesterday, but we will be out again regardless. Sue will be meeting a friend for coffee, and I have an errand or two to run.

Her First Parade

Good morning and good grief, for I have had this post sitting in my queue for a whole year. Last December I scanned some old negatives, including the ones below, of Shauna's first Santa Claus parade in 1973. I had other restorations to publish at the time, so when I couldn't get this posted before Christmas 2024, I put it aside for this year. With Christmas looming, I could easily have missed posting this year too.

These photos are of Shauna's first Christmas parade in Sarnia in 1973. A year or three later, we, somehow, managed to take her all of the way to the really big parade in Toronto.

We seemed to be early for this parade in Sarnia in the first photo, and we must have thought better of our location because we had changed position in the other pictures.

Sue's leather coat was tres magnfique! and Shauna was well bundled
against the cold, but if memory serves it was not a terribly cold day
 — milder Sarnia weather, not Ottawa winter weather.

Some folks think we take too many pictures, but looking back on them is a treat, and we enjoyed the slideshow on Shauna's birthday. I am not sure what the grandkids thought of it, but we who were present both then and now really appreciated the stroll along memory lane.

Happy Solstice

You've seen this photo here before but without the words. I think the low, weak sun with snow below is very suitable for a solstice card.

I haven't flooded you with photos from Sha's birthday, But I'll post a few now. I really like this candid of Dani, not so much of her although she is fine, but I find both the light and bokeh to be quite appealing.

Just a few other photos from the evening. You've already seen Shauna, but we'll include JJ and Sue too now.