Contented Kitties

The kitties got new catnip toys for Christmas.  The toys were a hit.

Fun Activity

This year we had a "fun activity" on Christmas Day.  I made a packet of the following Christmas-themed puzzles:  crossword, word search, jumble, and trivia.  People got points for attempting and completing those.  There was also playing a board game, leading a Christmas Carol, singing Christmas Carols, leading holiday-themed Charades, guessing Charades and creating a holiday scene using only the items in an envelope.  It was a fun way to spend the afternoon.  

Not everyone made a holiday scene, but here are the people who did.
Matt
 

Aunt Carol (hers won "Best of")
 

Aunt Pat
 

Christmas Morning

 

Vintage Cake!

Made for the Christmas Eve Eve celebration, this was the Old Vermont Burnt Sugar Cake with Maple Cream Cheese Frosting.  I found it to be so-so and the frosting lumpy.  It's a very moist cake, though.  That's a good thing.

You know you've been working hard in the kitchen when...

....nearly all the hooks are empty.
 

Stocking stuffer prep

St. Cupcake Caramels.  It was easier to make the caramels, then cut all the squares of waxed paper.

Midsummer Night's Dream

Thanks to a generous gift from a friend, we were able to see "opulent" Shakespeare rather than our usual "bare-bones" Shakespeare.  Fancy ticket prices buy you a shiny program, beautiful sets and incredible costumes.
 

Inside the program was this absolutely fabulous Character Muddle, so people could keep things straight.  I'm willing to bet English teachers have squirreled this away for future lessons.

This was a very enjoyable production with Jenni Putney bringing to life a very fun Helena and Daisuke Tsuji as a very musical Puck.  I loved the whimsical touches in the production: the toy piano, the Changling Child's amazing hair, one of the players using hand gestures (some of them rather rude) to help him remember his lines.  It was also great to check in with Andy Lee-Hillstrom, whom we loved in NWCTC's production of Dracula some years back.

Thanks for the tickets, Michael.  It was a great evening of theater.

Xmas Present prep

Starting the sourdough starter.

My photos, published.

What's that on the cover of Proud Ground's Newsletter?  Why, it's a photo I took.
 

And on the back?  Another photo first seen on this blog.

My favorite part of this photo is that the cookies were sitting on that exact same table, so I have a picture of cookies on a table sitting on that very same table.

Christmas Lights

Rather than buying a tree and putting it on the porch, I (and my trusty assistant, Matt) "built" four trees out of lights.  I'm quite happy with the effect.
 

A somewhat blurrier view, but with Sentinel peeking out the door.
 

First night of the Festival of Lights

Last year, enchanted with the burning of candles during Deborah's Hanukkah celebration, I resolved to celebrate the holiday this year by lighting candles.  I even bought a menorah on sale.  Alas, the first night of Hanukkah arrived and I couldn't find the menorah.  So I improvised.  One candle, one candlestick.
 

Sadly, my glass candlestick was not up to the rigors of hot flame and it broke, necessitating the blowing out of the Hanukkah candle.

It was not the most auspicious beginning.

Two of the Avengers get in the holiday spirit

I'm pretty sure Iron Man would be happy to wear a Santa Hat now and then.
 

But I'm not so sure about Thor.
 

Morphing layout of house

Every other month we host a game night at our house.  At our last one, I realized that we were scrunched around the table, while the whole living room went unused.  So for this game night we flip flopped the living room and the dining/game area, moving all the living room furniture to where the dining room table was and vice versa.
 

The living room furniture barely fit.  But we didn't need to sit on it, anyway.

It was good we did this because we had enough people attend that we had to break out the card table for a second gaming area.  Overall, I think this was  a big win and we will do it again for future game nights.