Festivities - How Our December Has Played Out

Quickly!   But, apart from that, we did do a few things.  The first weekend of December we dropped the little one off at a little kids' birthday party about 35 miles down South, then the Mrs. and I headed over to a little town called Kimmswick where there was supposedly some interesting Christmas festivities.  We were a bit disappointed.  The town seemed to only consist of a few cheap antique shops and craft shops with chintz merchandise imported from Asia.  There were only a couple of retailers with genuine merchandise, which took maybe 15 minutes to peruse, and that was about it.  All was not lost, though.  We did get a tip from a local on a good place for Christmas trees, the Imperial Farmers Market, in the town of Imperial.  Neat little country store!  From there we bought one of the nicest trees we've ever had: a 9 foot Fraser.  This is only the second time in 9 years that we've had a ceiling high enough for anything taller than 7', so I wanted to splurge.

We got the tree decorated finally, but that wasn't quite enough.  Athena wanted to make gingerbread cookies, so Mommy sat her down and put her to it.

I finished, what I thought was going to be all of our exterior Christmas lighting and managed to get a good shot on a clear night (one of very few this month).  

Well, I was browsing the Christmas aisle at the local Walgreen's, when I saw some discounted lights that matched our current red/green theme, and would fill the great void on the front of our house.  They went in the 1st & 2nd floor windows, and completed the look I was going for, for the most part.  

Jan became Santa's baker one night, and made candy galore.  

All last week I fought the Flu, possibly the H1N1, not sure, but we didn't do much of anything until this week.  Monday night we went ice skating at a small, outdoor rink close to the river.  It's a temporary setup, so it's small, but Athena had a good time and actually managed to stay upright for a good portion of it.  

After that, the rain threatened to set in from this big Midwestern winter storm.  Yep...that's all we get out of it...warm, balmy rain.  Might as well be back in Seattle!  I'm tempted to get out Saturday and drive about 200 miles to North Central Missouri, just so I can see some real snow from this big storm.  Instead of a "storm" chase, it'll be a "snow" chase!


Just the other day, Jan got an urge to clean her Frigidaire Flair oven, but we needed special cleaning solution, and I wanted chocolate powder for a mocha, so we ventured out to Trader Joe's and fought a bit of holiday traffic.  Then, upon returning home, Jan got to work on cleaning a 50+ year build-up of grime.  

And the results?  Smashing!

For now, we're just staying inside, working, cleaning, watching movies, and getting ready for tomorrow.  That's about it, in a nutshell.


Hope everyone has a delightful Christmas Eve and a long winter's nap.