Colorado Nutcracker

It was a big evening for Fina, Nana, and Papa. Dinner at Track Ten then the Colorado Nutcracker. We had "tower" seats which were directly over the orchestra. We could almost reach out and touch the curtain. Great seats, loved being so close to the stage AND watching every instrument in the orchestra throughout the show. We had dessert at Hurts Donuts on the way home!

Two Sazeracs and a Shirley Temple.

Fina knew many of the castmembers
from her days at Colorado Ballet Society.

Spiderman

Today's big adventure was a trip to the new BIG SCREEN at Icon Cinema to see the new Spiderman movie. It's a huge screen and theater space (all cushy, reclining seats), but we're a huge family, too, and we made a dent in the place. Jonnie has gotten quite proficient at Lego assembly; he did this project (below) entirely by himself. And at the bottom, check out the Christmas ornament the Flying Horse Foundation gave Jamie.

Spiderman on Icon Cinema's HUGE new screen.

And the Compound Makes 15 !

The Compound was at full strength today and at a record-high - 15 people. Sam completed the picture last night when he rolled in from Fort Riley. Besides lots of Christmas shopping, wrapping, etc. during the day, we started the evening with a "sleigh" ride behind two horses from the Flying Horse Ranch: Clyde and Clint (they're Percherons). Then dinner at the Club followed by a gingerbread house-building for some of the kids. At the bottom of the page is a thank-you gift Papa got from the San Luis Obispo Railroad Museum.

We all fit perfectly!

Two tables of 8.

Papa got this thank you gift from the folks at the San Luis
Obispo Railroad Museum today! It's a New York
Central (Railroad) Services oil can. The New York Central
eventually merged with my favorite railroad since childhood,
the "Pennsy", forming the Penn Central.
The spout is about 2' long.

"Bare Bones"

It was a fairly big weekend. Christmas shopping. Christmas baking. Christmas wine. Christmas music. Testing Christmas gifts. Christmas wrapping. Christmas kids choir at church. Christmas trombone concert; like, ALL trombones; we had to take Matteo - and then have a follow-up dinner at Basil & Barley.

Fina made some Christmas Gift Cookies

Christmas gift from California

Papa cooked dinner.

Stringy Slime testing.

Fina's teacher gift packets

The search for gold and diamonds

That's Lexi 2nd from left in the church kids' choir.
Tracy and Fina were down-low-front doing the motions.

When I was a kid, my Mom would write on all the packages
what the contents were - in shorthand! So I got
the chance this year to do similarly - in Hebrew!

"Bare Bones" Trombone Choir

High Schoolers' Party

We started off the day with a wind advisory. And then we had a snow squall alert. When it finally did snow, it lasted only a few minutes but for that time it was a whiteout. Right on the heels of Monday night's party came Fina's Christmas Party for her friends from school. Of course, a great time was had by all. Good thing we brought in the three snowmen. BTW, Fina's got a "lace-up" shoe now to transition to from the boot. It'll be a few more weeks yet and some PT. Damaged ligament.

Started off with a snow squall barreling down off the mountains.

And this was the A/C cover
from the other side of the house.

Prep for the High Schoolers' Party.
Decorate your own cookies.

And so the Cellophane Wrapped Christmas Gift begins.

The little stockings are for the High Schoolers' Party.

The party!

It really did stick.

Happy Birthday from Nipomo! Love the ESAero glass!

AJ had them on a down-stay for quite a while.

Staff Christmas Dinner Party

We pulled it off. A sit-down dinner party for about 18. It was one of those all-work and totally fun days getting ready and executing. Thank goodness it was a school day, too.

Bright and early Monday morning. The kids are off to school.

Cheesecakes are headed to the fridge.
There's a single chocolate chip in each that
won the recipient a Rational Bible!

Most of this wine and some cognac ended up in the beef dish.
And yes, we sampled them all.

That was fun!

Oh, yeah!

"What's Your Super Power" Ornaments.
The pictured instruction sheet is here.

Don't miss the French Radish Thingy...

Hot chocolate bar. Coffee available, too.

The kids snuck up for some dinner.

And for some hot chocolate!