Christmas + Ice Melting

I didn't intend to wait this long to start posting my Christmas vacation pictures! Now I'm betting most people are not in the mood for Christmasy pictures since we've moved on, but I decided to post these anyway. My family might want to look at them.

I didn't take a lot (for me), but tried to capture some of the scenes and activities. That ornament is one of my dad's because he used to ride a unicycle.

More still life scenes of the Christmas vibe at my parents' house. I love the blue poinsettias, no matter how unnatural they are. :)

This Christmas I flew in the Saturday before, so I had a few days to hang out and do Christmasy stuff with my parents and friends. In the past, I've flown in on the day of or Christmas Eve because of ticket prices and the way the days fell, but we planned further ahead and I really enjoyed my long visit. It gave me the opportunity to take my time and add some extras into my stay.

Such as a lunch outing with my friend M. This represents that, since I'm not sure if she's okay with me posting her picture. :) M's a longtime friend, but we've not had a lot of contact as we've aged, moved, and (in her case) married and had kids. I've really enjoyed the past couple of deep conversations we've had. It's great to reconnect with her. :) We went to New Earth, a grocery store in Yuba City that has an eating area.

My mom and I made Spritz cookies. Have you made them? We baked them a lot growing up, and I was craving some. These are wreaths, and I'm not so great at getting the sprinkles on the cookie.

Dania's dad sent my parents some Shari's Berries!

My mom and I put together a 3D lighthouse puzzle (seen in the tree picture above) that had all of the [plastic] pieces numbered, so it was pretty easy and more like a construction than a puzzle. It was fun to sit in the "Christmas room" (living room) drinking egg nog and relaxing. My dad even kept bringing us all sorts of treats. My cousin also stopped by to pick up some gifts, and it was good to see her, even if just briefly.

A picture of me waving to you in an ornament. And looking a little crazed.


My mom used to play French horn, so we have a few ornaments in that shape.

I also opened a late birthday gift from my sister that contained lots of candy (among many other cool things). I opened it then so I could share it with my parents, and in a slower moment of my stay decided to photograph some pumpkin spice kisses. These are weird. At first it's like, "Okay, that's nice, I've had my fill." But then there's a lingering flavor that makes you want MORE. So I ate too many. Have you tried them?

Skip ahead to Christmas Eve. My friend Dania and I have kind of made a tradition of going to dinner (usually at Chili's) on Christmas Eve and exchanging gifts. Since we were planning the SF trip, I wasn't sure if we'd be doing it this year, but was super happy when she invited me. :) Dania also brought me to a street in town that has lots of well-lit houses. I had never been to this particular street, for some reason. It was pretty crowded, as many people had the same idea, but we found a place to park on a side street and then walked around taking pictures of the houses.


Here you can better see the traffic and people.

Dania pointed this out to me because she had seen it before. Do you get it?

And now we're at Christmas morning. My family draws names for the adults, and I got my mom for the second year in a row. No probs, because she's easy to buy for. I don't know if she's opening a gift from me or my dad here, though.

My dad made Cinnabon cinnamon rolls for breakfast! So good. :D

My aunt gave my parents these measuring spoons, and I loved them! So now everyone gets to see a picture.

For Christmas dinner, my mom and I made these cute potatoes that I had seen on Pinterest only days before. They were more manageable than I had feared, and I want to make them again sometime. Here's the recipe. We used rosemary instead of thyme, since my parents have a lot in the yard.

We also had ham and brussels sprouts. (I guess I didn't take a picture of all the food together.) I was happy to help with the cooking, and it was all pretty delicious, but low-key with just the three of us.

So that was Christmas! And now I can move on to the SF trip next. :)

Before I go, I might as well post this time-lapse video I made, since it'll probably be forgotten otherwise. I decided to photograph ice melting, and I added some food coloring so the ice would show up better. It creates a nice effect. But melting ice is less predictable than I thought and there's some weird movement and lighting in these two sets of ice. That's all the disclaimer I'll include. :) Enjoy.

Ice2