Category Archives: Jaymison Joshua

Christmas Day 2025

Christmas day started quietly with just the two of us enjoying a Fancy Egg Scramble. I was able to set the table and make a few of the food preparations before the two sleighs from across the mountains arrived 3 minutes apart. Soon afterwards the Colville kids arrived and quiet was replaced with joyful chatter and anticipation of what Christmas day holds at Baba and Gramps’.

(A fair warning: This is a many many photo full post)

The centerpiece.

No white Christmas for us this year.

The birthday cake for Jesus arrived with the Bayles Mountain crew. Designed and planned by Addy and JJ and brought together by their mom. The stable, the star, Joseph, Mary, Baby Jesus, sheep, shepherd, 3 wise men and a donkey were all included!

Use your imagination and you’ll be able to see all the main participants. It took me a while to figure out that the marshmallows with the little bit of pretzel were the sheep!

This little guy was hungry and excited to see it was time to carve the Prime Rib Roast. He said, “that smells good!”

(A shout out to our local grocery store, Super 1, who offered their prime rib roasts at only $9.99 a pound, cut and tied. )

The menu consisted of Prime Rib, Yorkshire Pudding, Roasted Vegetables, and Creamed Corn (not from a can).

Christmas Day 008

This year the readings were from Luke, Hebrews and Philippians.

Christmas Crackers ready set Pull!

Presents and time for belly-laughs! Even though this was a ‘stocking gift’ year, the gifts seemed endless.

Time for comfy jammies or putting feet up watching a video sent to Addy and JJ from Great auntie Christina.

A Marco polo. Do any of you or your kids participate?

Here are some of our photos for our Christmas card greetings that we took over Thanksgiving weekend.

And that is a wrap of our preparing for and enjoying the day of celebrating the birth of Jesus with Angels watching over us all.

Boxing day and our For-Tea will be separate posts coming in the New Year!

Christmas Eve 2025

On Christmas Eve after our Candlelight service Jamie, Addy and JJ came over for a simple meal of Blintzes. Dan was working.

We all enjoyed our Blintze snack!

We let A & J open one of their gifts. I’m so glad we did because the sizing was way off on both of their boots! Yikes. Size 1 was more like a size 3 and the size 2 was more like size 1. I tucked them away to return to the store where we bought them.

We were all in church yesterday. Andrew and Katie hit the road for home right after church. Josh and Laura will be leaving this morning.

It will take me some time to gather up all the photos and thoughts for all the events we enjoyed together.

Enjoy the last few days of 2025!

My Talented Helpers

These kitchen helpers took over and whew after a few hours things got done.

Addy has mastered the art of kneading. She says it’s because she helps her mom make tortillas often.

After chopping nuts, JJ decided it was more fun to wash the dishes. He said it is fun to wash dishes the ‘old fashioned way’.

We had to wait for a couple hours for this dough ball to double in size. In the meantime we also managed to get one tray of Russian Tea Cookies done. I did not have a resident photo taker available and sticky hands did not help for me to take photos. My helpers went home for lunch and we went out for Chinese giving the dough time to rise.

When we got home from lunch the dough was ready. The finished product will be delicious but both loaves cracked. I think I rolled the dough too thin before rolling it up and baking it with the nut filling.

 

I need to make these more than once a year so I can master the method.

Today is Christmas Eve Day. The main celebrations start tonight into tomorrow. I hope you all have a very Merry Christmas.

Baking Day & Nostalgia

Today is baking day with the Grands.

Baking with Baba when they still needed a chair to stand on to reach the counters.

2022

2023

Baking day last year! They are taller this year and the mixing and rolling will be simpler for these two! Here’s hoping we remember to take a couple photos this morning!

Back to the present…

We woke up to an inch of snow on Monday but that has been washed away by rain. Between the rain and the snow we’ve had beautiful skies as you can see in the collage above from our Colville kids’ driveway.

Our Westside kids attended a early Christmas Eve service at Canyon Hills. Canyon Hills scheduled several Christmas Eve services this year and last night was their first of 8 services stretched out over 3 days!

We will be attending our Candlelight Christmas Eve Service at First Baptist Colville on Christmas Eve at 5pm.

I’m feeling a wee bit nostalgic looking at some photos from Christmas past…

I posted this one on Facebook yesterday.

Me, my sister Kathy and my sister Vera in Montebello, California 1967.

All eight of the Bagdanov siblings.

Our mom and pop.

Christmas Day growing up we had church on Christmas day regardless of the day it landed on. In the photos above taken on Christmas morning we were all dressed and ready to drive to Los Angeles for our Christmas services. We’d come home for lunch and then back to church in the evening. This might have been the last year we split our Christmas day at the Molokan church in the morning and the Russian Baptist Church in the evening.

I’ll save more nostalgia for another day.

Embracing the Days…

Catching up with some events from the last week. The super moon lit up the sky and our acres. So bright, it was almost as if we had street lights.

Addy’s last basketball game of the short season was on Saturday morning, the 6th of December.

As usual she played hard and well.

After the game all the ladies and JJ took in the Lady Lion’s craft fair in Kettle Falls. When we saw all we wanted to see we met up for lunch at TJ’s in Kettle Falls. Addy and JJ sat across the table from me and I took this shot of them.

Before the rains came and while the snow was still good enough for sledding, our Colville kids searched out their Christmas tree for 2025.

On Sunday while on greeting duty, I took this photo of the entry at our church. The Joy is real.

Our son planned a very special weekend in Nashville to celebrate Laura’s birthday. When they arrived an unexpected surprise for Laura was that cousins David and Kristin joined them for the celebration. It was an epic weekend for the four of them.

This is Nashville, not Iceland. Ice at Gaylord Opryland Resort.

All four of them described this weekend as unforgettable.

Monday was cheesecake baking day here at our country bungalow. I made two for our annual Staff/Deacon Christmas dinner which will be on Tuesday the 9th. While I mixed and baked our Christmas CDs were playing. While I was finishing up we got these two photos of our grands helping their Great Grandmother decorate her little corner tree.

This was our comp dessert at our anniversary getaway last week that I wanted to remember. It is a cotton candy sundae and it was delicious and unique.

In other news, I’m happy to report that our Christmas cards were mailed on Monday. This always comes with a sigh of relief and a smile of satisfaction.

Hopefully, I’ll remember to take photos at our dinner party tonight along with the finished cheesecakes.

Thanksgiving 2025

Hello December! Before we go full speed ahead we’ll catch up with our long Thanksgiving weekend festivities!

Thursday, Thanksgiving Day, we had a quiet start to the day as we waited for Andrew and Katie to arrive. Our Thanksgiving meal was slated for 5pm at our Colville kids’ home. Our only responsibility was making sweet potatoes with marshmallows toasted on top. Katie and Andrew arrived safely mid afternoon. We drove together to Bayles Mountain for our Thanksgiving meal.

What fun to get photos from both sides of the mountain and see that both of our sons decided to try to spatchcock a turkey this year. On this side of the mountains besides the spatchcock, Dan and Jamie cooked a traditional turkey with stuffing. Spatchcock was a huge success. Another favorite this year was Jamie’s homemade cranberry sauce with added raspberry, so delicious!

Addy and JJ both enjoyed having Andrew and Katie to help them with some projects while we waited for our meal.

Friday morning dawned beautifully as we waited to hear that Josh and Laura were on the road to our home.

We got the ‘on the road selfie’ and we counted down the hours for their arrival.

JJ was  pleased to see they brought the vintage G.I. Joe sleeping bag from the 80’s!

Very few photos were taken on Friday. Gramps made his tomato rice soup for us to enjoy and we added BLT’s to the menu.

After dinner we enjoyed some rounds of Skyjo.

Saturday morning found us eating together again!

Greg was on cooking duty again for his Swedish Pancakes and we all love to gather to eat them!

The agenda for Saturday included shopping ‘small business’ for the girls and for the guys chopping wood and preparing for Saturday meals including a birthday celebration for Auntie Lolo!

More about Saturday will come in a separate post.

Our Westside kids made it home safely on Sunday and we are thankful always for traveling mercies!

December is coming in hot with something on the calendar for each day this week! Whew!  I’m going to have to be intentional about pausing in the midst of this busy schedule to enjoy this Advent season.

 

A Thanksgiving Hodgepodge

 

Happy Thanksgiving to all who are celebrating this great day here in the United States! Gobble Gobble!

Thanksgiving week Hodgepodge has been dished out by Joyce From This Side of the Pond! Thank you!

1. Do you feel like you have a ‘full plate’ at the moment? In what way? 

 Yes, yes I do have a full plate at the moment. The calendar is as full as can be with Thanksgiving festivities, both spare bedrooms full for a few days. Monday after Thanksgiving ladies ministry meeting plus decorating our church for Christmas. Tuesday escape to Idaho for an overnight to celebrate our 51st wedding anniversary (December 6th is the actual day). Ladies Christmas party on Friday the 5th. I’ll fit in some Christmas decorating, too.

2. How did you learn to cook? If you have children did you teach or encourage them to cook? Do you like to follow a recipe or is your cooking style more ‘let’s wing it’.  

Mostly I learned the basics in my Home Economics classes. I didn’t cook with my mother growing up. My learning was hands on after I got married and it became my responsibility. My kids have the skills on their own initiative. Our sons are both good cooks. Our daughter can tackle any recipe. We modeled openness to invite people over to share a meal and our kids picked up on that. I follow recipes for baking but wing it a lot for spur of the moment meals.

3. Last time you bit off more than you could chew? Elaborate. 

Winterizing our property, namely the planters, this is more than I can chew. I’m hoping to bring in some help to complete this task. It’s more than my back can handle.

4. When did you last say ‘the more the merrier’ and mean it? 

Anytime my kids or family or friends want to travel to spend time with us I feel like the more the merrier.

5. Write an acrostic using the word T-H-A-N-K-S. 

Thank you, LORD God

Hope of Heaven

Acceptance you give me in Jesus

Nothing to doubt

King Jesus my Savior

Salvation assured

6. Insert your own random thought here. 

Last Saturday we attended JJ’s promotion at Taekwondo. He did very well and received his Tiger Badge.

He answered all the questions the Grand Master asked of him.  One of  the Tiny Tiger Creeds is “Tiny Tigers will obey their parents”. The Grand Master asked JJ why he should obey his parents and JJ answered, “because it is written in the Bible, Sir!” Well said, JJ!

Later on this day our Colville kids enjoyed their yearly tradition of a Christmas lights boat cruise on Lake Coeur d’Alene.

Thank you to all who stop by here. I’m thankful for visitors to my blog and fellow bloggers!

Fun Monday

Here is my first Fall puzzle and it was a doozey! I bought it at Union Gospel Mission Thrift store in Spokane for $5.

I’ve been working on it for a couple weeks.

Hooray! No missing pieces. I finished this up on Monday before JJ arrived for his afternoon at Baba and Gramps.

JJ lost his first tooth on Monday morning so we had to document that! It’s a little harder to bite into his snacks. This boy loves snacks.

Out for a trek to the mailbox with Gramps.

G.I. Joe with Gramps. The same G.I. Joe show his dad and uncle watched when they were boys. I remembered and mentioned to JJ that I thought his dad or uncle had their old G.I. Joe sleeping bag. JJ wanted me to call Uncle Joshie to see if he still had it. I said I would text instead. Then JJ added that if he still had it he could maybe bring it at Thanksgiving. Later that evening we got this photo with Uncle Joshie’s answer.

Yes! He will bring it at Thanksgiving!

Before we knew it, Jamie and Addy got back from Irish Dance to collect JJ. Addy always wants a rundown of all the snacks JJ had while she was at Dance.

Thankful in this season of thankfulness for the opportunity to spend time with our grandchildren and that we live in the same town.

A Full Saturday

Our first event of the day was Addy’s basketball game.

Those dribbling skills are really coming along this year.

After lunch we piled into our vehicle with Dan doing the driving for the rest of the day.  We were headed to Spokane for an afternoon performance of the Nutcracker. Granny Great bought the tickets as a Christmas present for each of us.

As soon as the show began there were no more photos. The sets and performances were top notch.

Addy appreciated the dance moves and JJ enjoyed the more acrobatic part of the show. We all enjoyed the show and were ready for dinner. We managed the extra traffic leaving the show and all gathered for dinner in North Spokane.

At dinner our selfie taker, Addy, stepped in for Auntie Lolo since Auntie was on the other side of the mountains.

Since it was a long day these two started fading and needed cuddles with mom.

We got home at bedtime for most of us! Thankful for safe travels there and back again.

It was a full day and we were thankful for good times with family and friends of family.

Monday Recap

The last week of October was a very busy one for us. Soon the golden beauty of October will fade.

While JJ was here in the afternoon, last Monday the 27th of October, he was able to make friends with this neighborhood cat that we are calling Stubs. Gramps actually named him because of his lack of tail. He’s friendly but we found out that he also likes to nip.

Stubs came for another visit during the week to say hello. Then another neighborhood cat came on the scene.

Friday we had the well drilling company in town come and replace a brass fitting. We noticed water on the ground in the well pump house and they determined that the fitting was cracked and needed to be replaced. It’s all fixed and we are happy to have that taken care of before winter.

Friday night was Halloween and time for our Colville family to come and Trick or Treat. They are our only trick or treaters. They came after their stop at our church Trunk or Treat Harvest Festival.

The hunting family with all their gear. Addy and JJ are enjoying one of the treats that Gramps and Baba found for them, creepy gummy eyes!

I trust your last week of October was a good one. Onward we go into November and adjusting to the time change, again!