Christmas Photos

This evening I was able to take a few pictures of my parents. My mum was trying on a new outfit that she purchased for a special occasion that's coming up soon.

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas to each one of you! For Christmas, my parents, Ann (my aunt from England), Duncan (my brother), Marlene (Duncan's fiance), Bob and Betty (Marlene's parents) were all here to celebrate.

The Glory of Christmas

The snow melted enough today so that we could go see the Glory of Christmas at the Chrystal Cathedral. Before the program, we had supper at the Cheesecake Factory. My aunt from England had never been to one before. The Christmas program was really good with Angels flying through the top of the church, live animals and great costumes. Driving home the roads were good except the last 6-8 miles which was mostly black ice due to the freezing temperatures. (not my pictures)

More Snow!

What a winter wonderland. Yesterday, we had about a foot of snow. Quite exciting for my parents and aunt that haven't seen this much snow since living in New England and I hadn't seen this much in years. It looks beautiful everywhere. Who knew SoCal had this much snow?! I cleared off my driveway with a dustpan and rubbermaid lid as I didn't have anything else that resembled a shovel. I closed the office around noon (yesterday). It took me 1 1/2 hours to drive home and get the car into the garage...usually only takes 15-20 minutes. Work was cancelled today as the parking lot was covered with a foot of snow and roads were pretty bad in the morning. It was our bosses last day and we had a big thing planned, so we had to postpone it until January when he'll be back this way.

Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow!

This morning we had a light powdering of snow. It looked really pretty, but didn't last.

Christmas Decorations

Tonight, I put up the Christmas tree. Tomorrow is cleaning night, then family will start arriving for the holidays.

Christmas Lights

This evening, I went with some friends (Ovi, Stephanie and their two kids) to the historic Mission Inn in Riverside to see the Christmas Lights. I took a few pictures of their family.
Here are pictures of the lights

Fire! Fire!

When my friend Steve moved into his house, he had a cleaning crew coming in and clean. Apparently, they missed the broiler plate under the oven.

On Friday evening, Steve was having about 30 people over for dinner. He had the oven on for about 4 hours cooking lots of lasagna. After everyone was there (except me), the oven caught on fire. Thankfully, he had a fire extinguisher to help put some of the fire out, but he used that all up, so had to call the fire department. People said that when Steve came out the kitchen, there was some coming out his mouth and nose from when he was in there trying to put the fire out. The wall behind the stove was 160 degrees and there was a concern that insulation might catch on fire, but thankfully it didn't. When I got there, the trucks had left, but there was ash on everything. The evening still was a success, there was plenty of other food and people all had a great time.

NOTE: If you don't own a fire extinguisher, go buy one. Safety First!

Mini Family Reunion

Last night we went out to eat at Cheesecake Factory in Scottsdale, AZ. Left to right, yours truly, Neville (my nephew), Duncan (brother), Marlene (Duncan's fiance), William (my nephew), Dawn (my sister) and Todd (Dawn's husband).

Engaged

Tonight, my brother, Duncan, proposed to his girlfriend Marlene. Congratulations to both of you!

Visit from LeRoy

Yesterday evening, my youngest brother called to say he was a couple hours away to pick up a tractor and was going to be driving by my house so would like to stop by and visit. It was nice visiting with him for a couple hours. We also talked to his wife with iChat. He left early this morning to try make it back home to Colorado by Thanksgiving.

Nikoli 1994-2008

Today, Nikoli went to sleep for the last time. What a sad day. He was a great cat and I have may happy memories of him. The first picture was taken in June this year. The second picture was taken in March. He loved to find a patch of sunlight to sleep in. As you can see from his partly opened eyes, he never missed a thing.

Learnfest - Sold Out

The Learnfest photography course near Atlanta next April went on sale today and sold out in three hours. Amazing! I guess that means I won't be going. I'm still so excited that I got to go the the first one that was offered. The class material for this one was going to be the same as the one I went to in Bald Head, NC, as there was a long waiting list. So, now I'll just have to spend the time practicing taking pictures.

One of my friends, Steve, wore a new suit today that he bought a couple weeks ago. He was a good sport and let me take a some pictures of him with a couple of his new ties.

New Book Arrived

I'm was really excited that the photography book I ordered came today in the mail. It's called "The Art of Children's Photography" by Tamara Lackey. She is one of the amazing photographers from Raleigh, NC that taught at the Learnfest photography workshop that I attended in Baldhead, NC. Her family is currently living in South America for several weeks while they adopt their third child, a little girl. Their first child is biological, and their second child is adopted from Ethiopia. All this and she has time to write a book and is working on her second. She is an amazing photographer of children, wedding, presidential candidates, Olympic athletes and other famous people. I also found out that she is donating all author proceeds from the sale of this book to the Worldwide Orphans Foundation and Save the Children. What talent and generosity.

Today, I learned how to encode website links into the words that are in blue and underlined. Learning new things everyday!

Gimbi, Ethiopia

The church I went to today had an Ethiopian lunch. This lunch was in honor of several people that will be going to Gimbi, Ethiopia this week. As I lived in Gimbi for several months in the early 70's (a total of 3 1/2 years in Ethiopia), I was interested in going and seeing if I recognized the food. It was actually much better than I anticipated...and not too spicy. The flat bread is called injera, and is broken into strips and used to dip into wat (the sauce). The Ethiopians use the strips of injera instead of utensils.