Oh what a wonderful Sunday we had with lots of good food, good friends, good stories, generosity, singing, and some very good news. I’ll be sharing fully after I’ve recuperated and the dishes are all put away!
Our hearts are full. Hope all is good in your neck of the woods.
On Wednesday night we drove downtown in the rain and wind to Dear’s company Christmas Party which of course they call a Holiday Event. For the next couple months Dear’s company is Dendreon Corporation. They are currently in Chapter 11 proceedings and the company will be auctioned off to the highest bidder on February 4th. In the meantime there are speculations flying around as to what large company might be interested in purchasing Dendreon. Dendreon has a treatment for Prostate Cancer. A very simple explanation about the treatment is that the patient’s own cells are treated to be able to fight the cancer.
We were treated well with good food and drink. There were two signature drinks. Orange for Dendreon and Blue for Provenge, the name of the cancer treatment.
The party was at the MOHAI in Seattle, Museum of History and Industry. It was a great setting for a private event. Some of my favorite displays at the museum were the following.
“It is fitting that the Toe Truck will be included in the museum’s eclectic collection of local memorabilia. Built nearly 25 years ago, the Toe Truck became a local landmark for millions of motorists during the more than two decades it was displayed outside the Lincoln Towing yard at Fairview Avenue North and Mercer Street.”
The Rainier Beer R was a landmark for years just off the Interstate in Seattle. The original 12-foot-high Rainier sign graced the top of the Rainier Brewery from the 1950s until 2000, and now rests restored at MOHAI.
I was happy to see items from my favorite team amongst the museum sport team memorabilia.
When we left and were waiting for our car I snapped some photos of the Space Needle. By this time the rain had stopped. We were very happy the company provided free valet parking for the event, too.
We are choosing joy as we continue to make preparations for the most wonderful time of the year and for all the unknowns of next year!
Someday we’ll know the real story on what that night looked like so many years ago. For now we rejoice in our dear Savior’s birth!
Preparations continue at this old house with little decorating tweaks here and there. Today I’m meeting the Senior walking girls for lunch and tomorrow night is Dear’s Company Gala Event. No fancy shoes for me yet. My toe is a whole lot better but I still can only wear flats. As Tim Gunn says “Make it Work”! I’ll make my flats work with my dress up clothes. How goes it at your place?
Oh, come, little children, oh, come, one and all,
To Bethlehem’s stable, in Bethlehem’s stall.
And see with rejoicing this glorious sight,
Our Father in heaven has sent us this night.
Oh, see in the manger, in hallowèd light
A star throws its beam on this holiest sight.
In clean swaddling clothes lies the heavenly Child,
More lovely than angels, this Baby so mild.
Oh, there lies the Christ Child, on hay and on straw;
The shepherds are kneeling before Him with awe.
And Mary and Joseph smile on Him with love,
While angels are singing sweet songs from above.
Words: Christoph von Schmid, 1794
I learned this song in Russian growing up and love to sing it today, too. The Russian words are different then the English translation but the ideas are the same.
I love this joyful time of year.
“Joy to the world! The Lord is come
Let earth receive her King!
Let every heart prepare Him room
And heaven and nature sing
And heaven and nature sing
And heaven, and heaven and nature sing”
The tree is decorated and we are all ready for our first Christmas party tonight.
My toe is better and I’ve been able to do whatever needs to be done except for aerobic exercising with the Seniors.
The next 10 days are filled with a variety of celebrations for Dear and me. I am no where near being done with Christmas shopping. I probably won’t really get going with that until December 15th.
How’s it coming together at your home?
We have lots of fun celebrations this month and we started last night going out to dinner for our DIL Laura’s birthday. After dinner at a new restaurant in our neighboring town we popped over to Katie and Andrew’s apartment for cake and presents. It was fun to see Katie’s creative tree on the wall since they won’t be buying a real one this year. On Monday we had a fun shopping day in Snohomish with Katie and that’s where the photo of her by the Snohomish River was taken.
I’m still working on getting all the decorations up for Christmas. Thursday we have a dinner here with our small group.
I’m having a hard time keeping up with blogs right now so I won’t be joining memes until I am sure I can get around and comment.
Life is rich! Hope all is well in your neck of the woods!
Some of you are new to my blog and aren’t familiar with a Christmas tradition we started several years back to take the stress out of finding the perfect Christmas tree. Our “Mystery” tree tradition goes like this…
We go to the nearest big box store and look for a tree in a certain height with a straight trunk and grab it with it’s string or netting in tack. This year the 6-7ft. trees in the Douglas Fir variety were about $25.00. We throw the tree in the back of the truck and head home wondering what it might look like once we cut away all the string.
This year it took most of the afternoon for the branches to relax as we had freezing temperatures here in the Seattle area and the tree was frozen. As it thawed we could see that it was another fine Mystery Tree choice. We’ve resigned ourselves to be happy with however it might look. Once the lights and decorations are added I’ll show more photos.
Slowly but surely it’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas at this old house.
I was so excited to see that WordPress is continuing their tradition of adding snow to my blog for the month of December!
Have you gotten your tree or started your decorating for Christmas?
I’ll be linking up to ABC Wednesday for the letter U soon. Thank you ABC Team and Denise Nesbitt!
Boy was I wiped out after a wonderful full day of celebrating with our kids yesterday. My kids are all adults so I can only imagine how much more wiped out I’d be if there were little ones to chase about the house and entertain…
The favorite new tradition were our Christmas Crackers/Poppers. We got such a kick out of the cheesy little gifts and jokes that popped out and we all wore our tissue crowns through breakfast. Josh and Katie pretty much wore their crowns all day long…fun times.
Santa really loaded up our stockings this year…
It would be great if in the U.S.A. Boxing day was a holiday, too, like Great Britain and Canada or St. Stephens Day in Ireland. Dear has been at work for many hours already. Dan will be hitting the road to cross the Cascade Mountain range later this morning. He should make it home in 5 or so hours.
I read up about Boxing Day online and it’s interesting to read some of the history. Here’s a little view of all our Christmas Boxes. This year was a banner year for boxes.
When Katie and I were in Vancouver B.C. I bought one thing at the Christmas Market, this pretty little bird.
Another new ornament that is perfect on my tree is this next one from Lovella. Joy really is fulfilled in Christmas.
This year my Wee Forest Folk Nativity is now complete. The last piece needed was the Wise Man in a Turban. He was under the tree this year…
I know lots of you are celebrating with your loved ones today. When your family expands you need to be flexible and go with the flow. Are you a Boxing day shopper? Do you rush out the day after to add to your Christmas stash from the clearance sales? For the rest of you I hope you have time to reflect and relax on this Boxing Day 2013.
May your Christmas Eve and Christmas Day be filled with lots of love and joy and a little ho ho ho!
This afternoon we’ll be at a Christmas Eve service and then come home and have some fresh hand made tamales for dinner.
By midnight tonight or a little after all our kids except for Andrew will be under our roof. Hopefully they’ll beat Santa here. Dear and I will be fast asleep by the time they arrive but we’ll let Katie greet the late comers and welcome them here.
Christmas morning we’ll open stockings first with a cup of coffee and then we’ll have our traditional Swedish pancake breakfast that Dear makes for us.
After breakfast we open up the gifts under the tree. This year after we read the Christmas story from Luke chapter 2 we are going to have Katie read a very interesting article on some of the Christmas story that has been ingrained into tradition that might be on the urban legend side of things and not really historically and culturally accurate. Don’t worry we don’t have our knickers in a knot. We still know the best truth of Christmas is that God came down and we can now be lifted up to Him through what Jesus did on the cross for us.
After we open up our gifts I’ll start preparing for our Christmas dinner. We will have our traditional Prime Rib and Yorkshire Pudding with roasted root vegetables, creamed corn from scratch, and a salad. For dessert this year I’m planning on making an apple tart from apples off of Dan’s property in Eastern Washington.
Of course all through the day we’ll have our favorite Christmas Cd’s playing in the background. Knowing our kids while the roast is cooking there will probably be some games around the table.
Praying you know the real Joy of Christmas!
Joy to the world, the Lord is come!
Let earth receive her King;
Let every heart prepare Him room,
And Heaven and nature sing,
And Heaven and nature sing,
And Heaven, and Heaven, and nature sing.
Joy to the earth, the Savior reigns!
Let men their songs employ;
While fields and floods, rocks, hills and plains
Repeat the sounding joy,
Repeat the sounding joy,
Repeat, repeat, the sounding joy.
No more let sins and sorrows grow,
Nor thorns infest the ground;
He comes to make His blessings flow
Far as the curse is found,
Far as the curse is found,
Far as, far as, the curse is found.
He rules the world with truth and grace,
And makes the nations prove
The glories of His righteousness,
And wonders of His love,
And wonders of His love,
And wonders, wonders, of His love.
God bless us everyone…
O holy night, the stars are brightly shining;
It is the night of the dear Savior’s birth!
Long lay the world in sin and error pining,
Till He appeared and the soul felt its worth.
A thrill of hope, the weary soul rejoices,
For yonder breaks a new and glorious morn.
Fall on your knees, O hear the angel voices!
O night divine, O night when Christ was born!
O night, O holy night, O night divine!
Led by the light of faith serenely beaming,
With glowing hearts by His cradle we stand.
So led by light of a star sweetly gleaming,
Here came the wise men from Orient land.
The King of kings lay thus in lowly manger,
In all our trials born to be our friend!
He knows our need—to our weakness is no stranger.
Behold your king; before Him lowly bend!
Behold your king; before Him lowly bend!
Truly He taught us to love one another;
His law is love and His Gospel is peace.
Chains shall He break, for the slave is our brother
And in His name all oppression shall cease.
Sweet hymns of joy in grateful chorus raise we,
Let all within us praise His holy name!
Christ is the Lord! O praise His name forever!
His pow’r and glory evermore proclaim!
His pow’r and glory evermore proclaim!
Words: Placide Cappeau, 1847
The Happy Wonderer ~ ellen b. 