Thirty Nine Years Strong…

Dear and I are at Semiahmoo Resort in Blaine Washington celebrating our anniversary. That’s White Rock Canada across the Salish Sea/Strait of Georgia/Semiahmoo Bay! We headed out for a morning walk but the wind chill factor threatened to freeze our faces off so we didn’t last long. I did manage to get some photos of the lovely views we have from this resort which sits on a spit between Drayton Harbor and the Strait of Georgia.

This was the view from our room last night when we arrived just before sunset. We headed to the restaurant to meet friends of ours from Birch Bay for Happy Hour.

When we got back to our room the hotel had left a nice little treat for us to help our anniversary celebration.

Back to this mornings freezing walk…

I thought of Vee when I saw this bush with the red berries.

We’re so close to White Rock, Canada that my cell phone company sent me a text warning me about international roaming fees. I called them immediately and told them I was still in the U.S.A. and they better not charge me for roaming fees. They were happy to oblige…

This building is the restaurant at Semiahmoo where we had our meal last night. Semiahmoo resort was closed for many months and was re-opened in August of this year. There are still several million dollars worth of renovations that they are in process of including renovating the rooms and the restaurants. We took advantage of the lower rates while they are in process.

In this next photo I tried to capture the stiff wind that was threatening to freeze our faces. I think the high today is only suppose to reach 28 degrees!

We have massages booked today at 2:00 in the Resort’s Spa. I’m really looking forward to that. We will be here one more night and then we’ll meander southward home tomorrow. Hope you all have a nice weekend.

Cookies!

We Gathered.

We huddled, prepared, and watched.

All hands in!

These hands made Lovella’s Nanaimo Bars, Marg’s Tee Gebaeck-Linzer Cookies, Anneliese’s Peppermint Cookies, Judy’s Peppernuts/Pfeffernuesse, Julie’s Chocolate Chocolate Gluten Free Cookies, Bev’s Honey Cookies. We also served appetizers (Red Pepper Jelly tarts, Judy’s Christmas Tree cheese board, Lepp’s prepared platters of cured meats, and Marg’s Apple Spiced Cider that was posted on the blog yesterday)

Each baker had her time in the spotlight!

Work continued out of the spotlight.

Judy had her own personal sous chef.

Even though I didn’t bake any of the cookies I got to stir!

I watched and smiled because for a change I brought along my own personal photographer. Note to sassy looking self standing behind Lovella: When you are behind the scenes and someone is taking photos you should always remember your weird expressions will get caught on film.

Favorite moment of the night…laughing about Anneliese’s good old pans!

When everything was said and done each guest at the cooking class got to take home one of these beautiful baskets of cookies the the girls had prepared ahead of time! All profits from last nights cooking class will be going to Matthew’s House in Abbotsford a non-profit help to families of children with disabilities.

Lovella took this next photo of Katie, my personal photographer for the evening. It was wonderful to have a traveling companion for the 200 mile round trip to the cooking class.

I managed to get one photo of my personal photographer before the class when we stopped for tea at Clayburn Village Candy shop where we had a lovely meal and we shared sticky toffee pudding for sweets before the sweets!

Dear and I are headed North again today. I’ll share more tomorrow on our adventure. I’m real happy someone else will be doing the driving the next couple of days.

Hope you all are enjoying some sweet moments in the bustle of this joyful time of year! Blessings…

Tower Bridge…

and the Tower of London.

Along with Big Ben and Westminster Abbey, the Tower Bridge tops Great Britain’s list of architectural icons that make up London’s distinctive skyline. While not the first bridge to span the Thames, Tower Bridge is the most recognizable and is often mistakenly referred to as “London Bridge.” While Tower Bridge is one of the world’s most famous bridges, few know its rich history.

During its original construction, Tower Bridge was considered the most impressive and advanced of bascule bridges. At the time, the hydraulics used to open the bridge were powered by steam yet still able to complete the feat within one minute. In 1976, the steam-powered pumping engines were replaced by ones powered by electricity and oil.

Tower Bridge is the only bridge on the Thames that can be raised and lowered to allow ships to pass. Supposedly, witnessing the Tower Bridge opening brings good luck because it’s such a rare occurrence. Visitors can ensure their luck by checking the Bridge Lift Times on the official Tower Bridge website.

For many, the famous nursery rhyme “London Bridge is Falling Down” conjures up images of the Tower Bridge. These individuals assume the rhyme refers to the raising and lowering of the bridge, but they are mistaken. The real London Bridge was located approximately a mile to the west of where Tower Bridge was constructed.
Throughout the centuries, a number of bridges have been constructed on the site of the actual London Bridge, some of which did fall into disrepair before being replaced. One of these bridges was sold to an American entrepreneur by the name of Robert P. McCulloch in 1968. McCulloch reconstructed the bridge as a tourist attraction in the desert city of Lake Havasu, Arizona.

The Tower of London has a rich and brutal history. You can read all about it on links at this page and others.

The Crown Jewels are housed at the Tower of London. You can read about the history and meaning behind many of the jewels here.

Today Katie and I are on the road to that foreign country to our North! We love to use our passports. We’re having quite a cold snap here and I hope our trip will be without snow. We are looking forward to being at Lepp Farm Market in Abbotsford ringing in the season with our Old Fashioned Cookie class. I guess we’ll need to choose a couple of our favorite Christmas Cd’s to enjoy on the road.

It’s a Christmas miracle at this old house. I mailed all my Christmas cards yesterday and now I feel I can relax for the rest of this week until we pick up our tree on Sunday! What do you like to see behind you during this busy time of year?

Birthday Celebrations!

Our DIL’s birthday is today and we got together this past Sunday to celebrate. We thought it would be fun to re-visit our most excellent England experience and headed to a British Restaurant in Redmond Washington for brunch/lunch. Neville’s is located in a trio of store fronts joined together in a strip mall in Redmond, Washington. There’s Nevile’s and then the British Pantry and the 3 Lions Pub. We had fun shopping in the British pantry after we had our meal.

We are so thankful to God for Laura and her all she adds to our family. Happy Birthday dear Laura. May God bless you dearly in your new year!

I’m happy to report on this Tuesday that our Christmas letter is done and copied off. I picked up our photo collage from Costco to pop in our Christmas cards along with the letter. That’s a load off. Now to address all the envelopes and stuff them. Tomorrow Katie and I head to Abbotsford, Canada to attend and participate in the Old Fashioned Cookie demonstration class that the Mennonite Girls are teaching at Lepp Farm Market. Fun times! Hope we don’t encounter snow. On Thursday Dear and I are headed to Semiahmoo Resort to celebrate for 2 nights. I’ll tell you what we are celebrating on Friday!

Big Ben

The Clock Tower of the Palace of Westminster – officially named Saint Stephen’s Tower – is commonly known as the Big Ben. The tower is one of London’s most famous landmarks.

The clock inside the tower was the world’s largest when it was installed in the middle of the nineteenth century. The name Big Ben actually refers to the clock’s hour bell, the largest of the clock’s five bells. The other four are used as quarter bells.

The hour bell was probably named after Benjamin Hall, the First Commissioner of Works. Some sources however claim the bell was named after Benjamin Caunt, a British heavyweight boxing champion.

The clock was the largest in the world and is still the largest in Great-Britain. The clock faces have a diameter of almost 25ft (7.5m). The hour hand is 9ft or 2.7m long and the minute hand measures 14ft (4.25m) long.

The clock is known for its reliability, it has rarely failed during its long life span. Even after the nearby House of Commons was destroyed by bombing during World War II, the clock kept on chiming. The clock’s mechanism, designed by Edmund Beckett Denison, has a remarkable accuracy. The clock’s rate is adjusted by simply adding small pennies on the shoulder of the pendulum.

The tower was constructed between 1843 and 1858 as the clock tower of the Palace of Westminster. The palace is now better known as the Houses of Parliament.
The clock tower rises 316ft high (96m) and consists of a 200ft (61m) high brick shaft topped by a cast iron framed spire. The clock faces are 180ft / 55m above ground level.

HT: A View on Cities

I just have a few more England Trip posts left and good thing because the Christmas/Advent season is here and so many wonderful things happen this time of year. I hope that joy and peace will fill your hearts during your busy days. And in the spirit of this post I hope to fill my “time” with good things. We celebrated our Daughter in Laws birthday today and I’ll share about it on her actual birthday which is December 3rd. I’ve pulled the cards out and have to get busy on our annual letter (I could write a book about 2013). All the Christmas bins are down from the attic. Fun events planned for Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. I wonder if I can get those cards done by Wednesday morning?? If not there’s always next week…

I’m so excited that it’s snowing on my blog. It happens this time of year without me doing anything. Thanks WordPress!

What is going to fill your time this week?

The Advent of Our God ~ Hymn

The Advent of Our God

The advent of our God
Our prayers must now employ,
And we must meet Him on His road
With hymns of holy joy.

The everlasting Son
Incarnate deigns to be;
Himself a servant’s form puts on
To set His people free.

Daughter of Zion, rise
To meet thy lowly king,
Nor let thy faithless heart despise
The peace He comes to bring.

As judge, on clouds of light,
He soon will come again,
And all His scattered saints unite
With Him in Heaven to reign.

Before the dawning day
Let sin’s dark deeds be gone;
The old man all be put away,
The new man all put on.

All glory to the Son
Who comes to set us free,
With Father, Spirit, ever One,
Through all eternity.

Words: Charles Coffin, 1736.

The Happy Wonderer ~ ellen b.

To honor and encourage

Monthly Archives: December 2013