Merry Christmas!

No doubt we are having a white christmas, it has been snowing and snowing and snowing, supposed to get a foot christmas eve, but then again it was not supposed to start snowing until 6pm, rather it started at 6am.........my son asked me where the sun was! Wishing you and yours a safe and warm holiday spent with those you love!

stressful business

I feel an urgency these past two days, so much to do, while we got our tree, it was very dry and needs lots of water, so we have been giving it as much as it will take, so far about 4 liters....we have yet to hand lights or decorations on it, hopefully later today, but I need to make 2 batches of dog treats, one of delcos, then hang some ceiling tiles, move a hanging lamp upstairs and a floor lamp downstairs, the hanging lamp is an antique and cannot be stored in any position other than hung or it will stress the glass......and I am so stressed to find all my hidden surprises for the family and wrap them then put them under the decorated tree......just feels like there is not enough time, since we are both working this week and have a charity dinner tuesday night and then christmas celebrations with my family christmas eve, this all needs to be done before tuesday night! not to mention the normal 3 meals a day, laundry, baths and keeping it sll together, oh and i still have some dvds to make as well!

we finally got our tree

I have been accused of many thing and one of them validly, I am a control freak, I have this order of things in my head that must happen, sometimes I express it verbally, sometimes not, after more than one bickering match, I finally let my husband in on some part of my christmas secret code, my christmas cards must be done first, and i prefer they mail on the 10th, I was late this year, then I bake or make items as gifts, some flop so we have to eat them, sad us, lol, then at some point around the 15th i like to get a tree, preferably tall and skinny or at least not 85 foot in diameter at the bottom, then after the tree is trimmed, i wrap presents since I now have somewhere to put them, why wrap them just to hide them in a closet or pile them in an unused room? We got our tree, it will be decorated today and i can then wrap and artfully place the gifts, which are not going to fit where they need to as it is, we have gotten a small tree and put it on our hearth, so there is limited space in which to place the gifts, so I am having to move some hearth items to the laundry room, mostly......thankfully the tree will only be up about a week, so less mess we can hope!

snow snow snow and boys

I have icicles hanging off the roof, the deck, the truck, heck even me, it is bitterly cold, that dry cold that makes your lungs hurt to breathe.....what we got today was all powder...pure perfect powder flakes that keep coming even now but not as large and heavy, we live in the mountains in a neighborhood where most of the homes sit empty as 2nd or vacation homes for bay area residents, some homes are vacation rentals and I think in this housing glut some are being rented yearround to the young 20ish kids that snowboard and seem to be mostly guys, well the house beyond a vacant wooded lot from us just rented last week to 4 of them, i think the home is maybe 1000 square foot, so yesterday when the snow began to fall they put a ramp, my husband said a half pipe and let the snow cover it and then today they spent the better part of the day, 5-6 hours, shoveling snow into a full on half pipe, now they have a subaru with a tow rope and a snowboard connected guy that gets towed up the street then back down at about 40 mph then the snowboarder lets go and goes up the ramp and back down, but to me it looks like they are trying to get air.......they groom the slope and have industrial lights out to light it, just wild! my fear is I have a son, how long until I am worried about him and his hijinks?

my mind lets go a thousand things....

like dates of wars and deaths of kings, yet remembers.....this very bower..... THE world is too much with us; late and soon, Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers: Little we see in Nature that is ours; We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon! The Sea that bares her bosom to the moon; The winds that will be howling at all hours, And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers; For this, for everything, we are out of tune; It moves us not.--Great God! I'd rather be A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn; 10 So might I, standing on this pleasant lea, Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn; Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea; Or hear old Triton blow his wreathed horn. 1806. why are wordsworth's words stuck in my head today???? Could the hub ub over the holidays and the purchases made be driving me to remember that once during the Romantic Age some fine scholarly men, and women, less famous, thought their society had run amuck......well here I am saying society has run amuck!!!

moon photography

For whatever reason, I had a nutty time, while doing dishes I spotted the clouds breaking over the trees and an almost full moon emerging, the urge hit me to try to play with the settings on the camera and capture this oak moon, this bitter cold, huge moon of december......having battled the camera last sunday and then again today with the effect being NO photos of my son with santa, I was in for it.....first trip out front the camera will not leave aperture mode, becomes frozen and even after turning it off and on again no photo taking ability, yet the battery reads full.....decided to swap out the batteries........I came into the house a partial icicle to discover that the spare batteries were not where they should be...in the camera bag, remembering my issues last sunday, I looked in my purse.....not there......then tore through the diaper bag, the back of the truck, a toy box, a bin of rubber stamping supplies....no batteries, in my utter annoyance my husband offers to help look, he begins tearing apart things, so then my son thinking it is fun, dumps all his toys from the toy box.....I ask my husband to go through my purse.......after his 2nd try he finds them and i have a small purse but he always jokes it is like mary poppins carpet bag cause it looks small but i manage to pull things out of it all the time that should not fit! Batteries changed i reset the camera to night landscape mode and clicked about 30 photos from the front yard......of course i had to wait a few times for the clouds to thin out, then hubby tried from the backyard but our motion lights made lighting an issue......I thought some turned out best and surprisingly the best mood shots were the ones with clouds glowing pink!

a white christmas is probable

winter feels like it has set in, that full moon beckoned us to look to the sky, it was a huge moon a few nights ago, making me unable to sleep but with more energy than usual, and now, we cannot see the sky for the clouds and snow falling, windy last night, forcing us to bring in our holiday decor, and now just icy crunching and cold darkness that makes you colder for noticing that you cannot see the mountains.