Parties & Painters

Greetings!  I wanted to share with you this painting I did many years ago using ink from an Octopus.  Yes, ink from a real octopus.  Friends of mine that lived in Alaska caught an octopus in their fishing net and collected the ink and sent it to me.  This was my first painting using it and I just love this image.  I did the painting from a photo I'd take of Dayle pulling all 3 of our little children on a sled down the driveway from our first house here in Corbett on a snowy day.  Our liver spotted Dalmatian was enjoying the snow, too. Shawn our older son was on the back of the sled and Amy was in front of him and she's holding the baby, Travis.  Dayle is slipping a bit and is wearing a hat I knitted for him from my handspun alpaca in creams and browns.  Fond memories.

That little girl is now grown up, and has two beautiful daughters of her own.  And she moved 2,000 miles away.  ::sigh::  But here is a photo of the three of them when she took the girls to a performance at a local school of the Nutcracker.  I miss them so so so so so so so so much.  

Yesterday afternoon we attended a holiday party for the board of directors of the Friends of Multnomah Falls.  Here we are playing a fun gift exchange where you roll the dice to pick a gift.  They are white elephant gifts, it's fun! 

Our host, Billie, grew up in Texas and always prepares a lavish feast of Tex-Mex delicacies and this year she tried a new dessert that was out of this world.  It's called Caramel Pear & Cranberry Pudding Cake and it's made in a slow cooker!  Recipe HERE. 

After dinner and conversation around the table and the gift game, we joined Billie around her prized player piano and sang Christmas carols along with the old time music.   

Billie's husband Kent passed around jingle bells to us all to play while singing "Jingle Bells".  A fun time was had by all. :-) 

They have a wonderful restored juke box.. they played some songs on there for us too.   

Dayle got up early for the painters to arrive, when I arose they had some of the draping up for painting the ceiling.   

I really admire these guys as they are expert at working around people's homes while full of furniture and "things".  Here is Rene painting the dining room ceiling, already you can see how much brighter it is!

Oh boy.. I do hope this gets done soon.  I am losing 2 weeks of decorating for the holidays.  Wah.  I am so enjoying seeing all the decor from my other blog friends.. it's hard not to be able to be sharing my "stuff".  But, I have to look on the bright side, at least we still have a home and that it didn't burn worse than it did or burn all down!  Eek!

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*M*E*R*R*Y* *C*H*R*I*S*T*M*A*S*!*
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((hugs)), Teresa :-)