Hope Everyone's Was Merry!

Hoping everyone had a very Merry Christmas! Amazing how much preparation goes into the celebration and then "poof!", it's December 26th. We had a great time and excellent feast!

Preparing for the Feast

Three great cooks in our kitchen. Ray, Rickie & Erin.

It's hard to keep them out of the kitchen ...

though I've yet to ever try (and can't imagine why I would!).

Among the first of my pics with my new macro lense.

It's going to take a lot of practice, but I'm looking forward to it :)

Symbols of the Season

Traditions



Hope



Angels



Love & Faith

Joy!

Holly-Jolly

Well, I did get a Christmas Tree on Monday (yay me! LOL) and it's had a few days now to settle; so this weekend we'll decorate it ;) Then it's it's time to dust off that party hat, because the festivities go into full swing: Mya's recital on Thurs, Party on Friday and a Wedding on Saturday!

In the meantime, and in the Spirit  of the Season, here's a pic I took of some Holly on our recent visit with John & Rosi ...

And in the Spirit of "Fun!"; here's one of Tugboat & Lola playing a game of "Tug" ... Hmmm, who do you suppose is winning??

And being the true gentleman that he is, he not only let her win, he did the dishes too (cleaned her food bowl, on numerous occassions)! By the way, my father-in-law (John) caught this pic using my camera :)

Oh! I also want to say thanks to my regular visitors for coming back, as well as to my new visitors from Denmark, Canada, Croatia & the Philippines!

I've also started a new page at http://ChristineStonebridge.imagekind.com/ where my pirints are available (framed, or not). While some of the prints have previously been posted here (in low resolution), I've been going through my collection from this year and adding many new images soley to that site. Hope you find a chance check it out (and maybe share the link) - your thoughts would be welcome :)

Getting Into The Spirit of the Season ...

Ho!Ho!Ho! Well what'dya know ... It's here again. Christmas!

Despite my plans of going out & getting a Tree this weekend; I easily let it slip by.

I could say that I did it in an effort to be "green",

reasoning that it makes more sense to pick one up after work tomorrow;

But the honest truth is that ...

Procrastination is an Art, and I am an Arteest!

We got our first cold snap earlier this week, which always gets me in the spirit,

and it works on our winter plants too ...

Christmas Cactus Bloom

Palms & Poinsettias

Revelations

Visiting with Sheryl last night (also a fellow shutterbug), I revealed that the pics in my post titled "Fantastical Friday" where alas, not of beer bubbles. I can certainly see this as a logical guess; they do look like beer and everyone knows I do love beer ;)  Here is the "real story" ... a beautiful ornament given to me by another of my closest friends, Tasha.

Yet another fun thing with photography, by selecting what part of an image to show, we're able to spark the imagination.

Wishes ...

More pics from our stay with John & Rosi.

Colony of Wishes

Make a Wish

Despite the fact that there'd been a freeze, these Ladybugs and this defiant Dandelion

seem to be there as a reminder that wishes are are never out of season.