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Against all odds, it snowed on Christmas Day!! I couldn’t believe it when the rain kept getting more full-bodied and white. Such a pretty, cozy, unexpected treat. I didn’t manage to take any photos during the daylight, but here’s the snow lit by the tree in our backyard that Kristina decorated. We may have to leave these lights up year-round. 🙂

(Though we won’t keep that enormous pile of brush.)

Merry Christmas!

Despite our intentions of having a tree set up and ready to decorate when Kevin’s family arrived, we spent those last few days madly drywalling, and then the last 24 hours madly cleaning up a month’s worth of construction tools, dust and debris. In the end, it wasn’t until they arrived that we piled in the car to go find one. It turned out to be a great group activity. We headed over to our old neighbourhood, and though the lot that I bought from last year had already been taken down, we spotted another tree lot behind one of the drive-up espresso huts. We all seemed to love the same tree, but the price was atrocious, and so reluctantly we left. The lot guy followed us back to the car and offered a $20 discount, which made it merely expensive, and so we took it.

It’s definitely the prettiest of the Boston and Seattle trees I’ve had over the last five years. Lots of strong branches, and it’s full while still having plenty of holes for ornaments to hang in. The needles have a pretty blue tint to them. And it smells wonderful.

After bringing it home and chopping off the base, Kevin and his dad got it in the stand:

We listened to the Josh Groban Christmas cd that Kevin’s mom gifted us with, I put up the lights, we all did ornaments, and then Kevin and Kristina finished up the tinsel. So pretty.

We also did several spots with spare pine branches, pine cones and candles. On the family room windows:

(and a dramatic zoom-in)

… the living room,

… and the kitchen.

The fish room fireplace got a wreath. (We’ve actually had it since the beginning of December, during one of the Home Depot runs. It’s a little squashy by this point, since it keeps launching itself off of the wall and onto the floor.)

To get in the spirit, we had strawberry-basil martinis – more of a summer-by-the-grill drink, but the colors are seasonally appropriate at least, and it’s been the house drink of 2007 so we felt obligated to serve it to our company. 🙂

As everyone finished up the tree, I finally wove my advent wreath. (Here, concentrating and intent.)

Instead of four weeks of advent, it only got four days. But it was bright and new (instead of dry and crispy) for the visit, and it meant that we could actually leave the candles burning for all of dinner each night, which was pretty.

Oops, didn’t mean to vanish. It’s been just busy here and Kevin seems to take his camera to work on the days I’m determined to post, and so I fell off the blogging wagon.

A summary of the last week and a half:

• Everyone in hats: it’s so warm when the furnace blows, but so bitter cold 5 minutes later. I can’t bear to turn it up (all of that money just goes straight into the SKY), and so we’ve been sporting layers and stylish hoods for the last month or so. I call the insulation people a few times a week, but apparently everyone in the Seattle area is as cold as we are and it’s the “busy season”, so we’re just breaking out the lap blankets and being patient.
• It REALLY snowed!

  We spent all Saturday watching it flurry and then it started snowing in earnest. A gorgeous twilight, though still not that bright snow blue that you see in New England. I read Robert Frost and played with mortgage calculators all night – a wonderful evening.

  Some pictures: a lacy tree in the front yard (don’t the pine trees just LOOM?)

  

  You could see the snow-laden branches over the driveway from my desk until the light became too dim:

  

  It was so fun to sit there and watch it accumulate while listening to all of the snow falling off the pines onto the roof.

  And an early shot of the backyard (ferns look so odd in the snow):

  

• Water heater drama: we’re stuck in the sixth circle of customer support hell. It’s a LONG story, but at this point I’m tempted to cancel the whole thing and start from scratch.
• Family room progress: the carpet is ordered, the couches get here next Wednesday, and the drywall is ALL UP. Hurrah! Now to tape, spackle with joint compound three times, prime, and paint before Kevin’s family arrives in 8 days… Perhaps this is why two scheduling-optimistic people shouldn’t manage the same project?
  We’re also looking at paint. (I have to wonder who’s job it is to name these colors? “Eiffel Tower”, “Stormy Weather”, “Tattered Sail”? Hmm…?)

  

  The (green) couch fabric sample looks different in almost every light, and we won’t have a carpet sample until next week. Very hard to choose!

• Kevin’s room progress: it’s (mostly) clean and put-away, and the new desk is all set up! AND, Kevin spent time in the crawl space, so the room is now also all CAT5e-wired for internet (with 4 connections for the room). Kevin’s thinking about paint and a little area rug for the floor, but those can wait until after the holidays. Pictures to follow. 🙂
• Flat Stanley: my cousin sent me a “Flat Stanley” cutout – they’re reading the book in school and he chose me to escort the paper doll around for a few days and send back a letter about what we saw. It’s been so fun to think of things in the area that are worth showing, though the request for photos of Flat Stanley is hard – I haven’t printed paper copies of digital photos since 2000. ???
• Back yard progress. The whole time I was raking, I had “ but a crop is a crop / and who’s to say /where the harvest will stop?” stuck in my head. Thank you Mr. Walker, and thank you Robert Frost. Search for “Gathering Leaves”, for those who still have leaves in their yard or gutters… Those lines have always worked for me for snow, too, though perhaps the first ten lines of “Our Singing Strength” are better?

Tomorrow: hopefully a real post with more recent pictures?

Another dinner, since Larry (aka best man extrodonaire and the most favourite third wheel ever) was back in town interviewing – yay!! Shawn and Sanna and William the puppy came over to join us, and we did french onion soup and strawberry salad with the poppy seed dressing, plus a fair amount of cheese and crackers while we got ourselves in gear. I have my fingers so crossed that Larry moves back out.

(PS. The out-of-season tulips that appear to be sprouting out Kevin’s head arrived with Larry — gorgeous. When I’m not hauling them from room to room to hang out with me, they’re sitting in our sunny kitchen window and keep greeting me when I walk into the room. 🙂 So pretty.)

Another mystery project, details to follow, but on the plus side, I’m FLYING through it.

There’s so much going on (cleaning, organizing my mind for the move, starting to sign up contractors, work, etc), and this is totally putting a crimp in the progress on the quilt, but in a good way. I love the color, and I love the yarn (Cotton Classic – not the first time I’ve worked with this one, but always enjoyable.)

We’re leaving for a road trip in about a minute, but before we go, look at my awesome bag!

The pocket on the left is all of my normal purse stuff, the middle holds 5 possible knitting projects, and the pocket on the right holds just my current things. Wow! Plus all of the little zippered and snapped compartments your heart could desire.

And even better, here it is closed next to my 6″x8″ cutting mat for size reference! Neat!

Alright, off to Wyoming!! We’ll take pictures!

We were invited to go see the Red Sox vs. Mariners game on Sunday, by friends of my parents that live in the area. The game was amazing, and the seats could not have been better. We were front row, right behind the Red Sox bullpen. On the whole, I’m not a particularly star-struck person, but it was a thrill to keep seeing all those faces from 8 feet away.

The game was neat. In addition to gorgeous sunshine and all of the Blue Angels flying around for Seafair, the Red Sox were just ON. 9-2!, Manny had a home run, Ortiz stole second base, there were several amazing layout catches, and the Mariners moose ran over Coco Crisp with an ATV.

varitek was having trouble hitting, but he just kept battling all game. He’s so serious and professional. His last at-bat was a long series of fly balls. He didn’t end up getting on base, but you had to admire his perseverce.

Kevin got a great shot of Ortiz clocking it.

He was probably the most fun to see in person and close up. When he was warming up before going up to bat, it was just incredible to see how powerful a person he is. You just don’t get that from TV. (Plus there was a pretty major contingent of little kids all obsessed with “Big Papi”. Good to see that these west coasters are raising their children right. :-P)

Here are Ortiz and Crisp congratulating Manny on his homer:

.. and mirabelli yelling at the moose after he clipped Coco Crisp. The bench was really upset.

And it was fun to see Beckett pitch such a great game. Here he is coming off in the 8th.

Baseball games don’t get much better than that.

It came!

The UPS guy knocked on the door around 10:30 with the Harry Potter book from Amazon. I love the packaging.

I know it’s a huge money maker for Amazon, and obviously they’d go out of their way, but the Saturday morning delivery was a brilliant idea.

The book itself was interesting. I really don’t think it’s a kids book. And I can see why Rowling thought it was the book to write, but I wish she’d chosen a different path. I can’t wait until everyone’s done reading and the conversation starts — there’s certainly enough to talk about.

The kayaks have, to my chagrin, become total indoor pets. They hang in their slings, they hold wedding veils and snuggle up to the hoarded packing supplies from registry gifts. It was time for them to go out and rediscover their niche: water, wildlife, and adventure! 🙂

We headed out on the afternoon of the fourth — rather a lot of adventure!! Between a slight breeze and plenty of boat traffic, the waves were *huge*. We paddled gingerly to the next beach, and then literally surfed back. Lots of fun, if short.

I got to try out my boat cart for the first time. It is MUCH lighter and easier to handle than tromping the whole boat down the hill. That part is a relief. I’m going to have to learn to get used to other bits… It is quite tricky to load the kayak onto the cart (there’s no kickstand, so the wheels roll wherever they please), and I had to stop to retighten the strap, but we realized midway down the hill that I had used the kayak leashes (made of thin elastic cord) to anchor the boat to the cart, so it might be a lot easier when I buy a real tie. 🙂

Our conclusion after lugging the things up and down the hill was that the “in & out of the apartment” is still the most difficult and stressful part by far. They have to come off the rack, around the fishtank, through the front door, and down from the 3′ high deck with a railing. It’s a lot of 90 degree angles and fear of property damage. Once again, I wish dearly that we had a garage.

Kevin was holding off on buying a cart, but it’s about a third of a mile down to the beach, and his boat is heavier than mine, so he (thankfully) succumbed to massive peer pressure and bought a cart, too. His cart rests under the cockpit of his boat, instead of under the stern, which may make it truly light to heft. It’s supposed to get here on Wednesday. I’m looking forward to weekends, and entertaining hazy dreams of kayaking before work when the lake is flat… maybe? Neither of us are expected until 10, and it gets light at 4:45, so it’s certainly a possiblity.