Just three photos left. I can’t believe it. This has been a fun week (except maybe Christmas Day). Kathleen woke up sick after our rich Christmas Eve meal and didn’t make the trip with me to Olympia to see my daughter and her incredible family. My grandkids are awesome, my son-in-law is awesome, and I loved being there, but it was a lot of driving all by myself. The rest of the week was great. I am very happy that on Wednesday, I will take my last shot of the year, having done the entire 365 without missing a day.
I told Kathleen this morning that I have decided to do another 365 project 
. The last one I did was in 2015, so here we are in 2025, and I think I will start my next one in 2035. Of course, I will be 83 then, but I hope to still be taking pictures.
Here’s the group from this week. If you want to see all the Halloween costumes mentioned in the Christmas Day caption, go to the 365 page (in the menu above) and scroll down to the slideshow for December 25. I think the shot of Keeley is my favorite.
-
- Took Keeley on a 3-mile walk today, and we went to Duck Lake. It’s about 1.5 miles from our house. I have taken photos of this lake before, but never with this much water. Usually, it’s a big swamp or bog, but with all our recent rains, it’s a lake again.
-
- I spent most of today doing one of my favorite things…cooking. I love to braise. It might be my favorite cooking method. Just the idea of something cooking at a simmer for a very long time (in this case, three hours) is appealing. This is for our Christmas Eve dinner. If you have the time, when you braise, do it early in the week and let the meat sit in the refrigerator in the cooking liquid. Then I take it out about three hours before dinner and let it warm slowly. For the last few years, our menu has been this dish as the entrée…Balsamic Short Ribs. Accompanied by a very rich Potato Gatto, a large green salad, and whatever wonder Michelle brings for dessert. As you can see, I make a bunch of the ribs. Lots of balsamic vinegar, beef stock, a ton of onions and garlic, and plenty of oregano.
-
- Out for a walk with Keeley again today, I crossed a walkway over water that you have seen before, so I turned around and shot the babbling brook behind me. I always recommend looking behind you when you take a photo. You sometimes find hidden gems.
-
- Last night was our Christmas Eve celebration with my son, Kathleen’s daughter and her husband, and two good friends. I got to cook for three days (which made me very happy), and later, while we were just sitting around as Michelle got the desserts out (she always brings dessert), I snapped some photos. Yup, they are officially snapshots. But I will think of them as candid portraits. I am really sorry that the ones I took of our friend Carrie and Michelle didn’t come out. They either had their eyes closed or were moving around so quickly that their faces were a big blur. Merry Christmas, everyone. We are heading south to see the other daughter, her husband, and our grandkids.
-
- Kathleen’s son-in-law Brian and one of my best friends.
-
- My son Joshua
-
- Our good friend Jocelyn.
-
- The Love of my Life
-
- Of course, today is Christmas, and sadly, Kathleen was not feeling well, so I made the trip to Olympia myself. This is the biggest reason. I have always loved fooling my kids on Christmas. I am that guy who wraps a ton of stuff and puts it inside bigger boxes that I wrap as well. Once, I even built the world’s worst dollhouse for my daughter as a joke. The real one she had wanted was out in the garage. This year, I decided to give her and her husband some photos to put on the blank walls in their guest room, where we stay. I started with a box containing a picture-hanging kit and a note saying she needed stuff on the walls and that I had taken the liberty of giving her some of my best shots, all printed on canvas. 14 in total. I could tell by the look on her face after she read that note that she was worried she was just getting some of my travel photos, which meant nothing to their family. But that was not to be. You see, since my grandson was born, she had become the master of group Halloween costumes. So I ran big and small canvas prints of all 14 of them. I figured that once you see them opening them, you might want to actually see the prints, so they are on this post as well. Merry Christmas!
-
- Well, no white Christmas for us. The snow arrived a day late. It’s not too much, and it didn’t show up until almost 7:00 pm on Boxing Day, but we still have some white. Let’s hope it’s all gone in the morning…or worse, that there’s more of it.
-
- There is little to say. Snow, sun, blue sky, pond, reflection, beauty, nature. It all makes me happy, one more time, that I live in Trilogy. Our trails are wonderful.
-
- Strangely enough, I took this photo a couple of days ago but didn’t use it. To keep myself honest, I took it again today. I liked it a lot when I took it on the 26th, but then it snowed, so I decided to use that shot. So here it is again. We have a collection of Santas from all over the world. You saw one of them at the start of the month. This one has lights on it, which makes it even better.
Creativity is a wild mind and a disciplined eye – Dorothy Parker
0 Comments