Wrapping, Advent, Old Friends and a Farewell

Season's Greetings my friends!  Things are humming along on track here in the old farmhouse.  Two important items arrived yesterday so I got to wrapping them up and they are now under the tree.  Michael brought down my box of bows and lo and behold, this music box was in the bow bin!  So, I wound the mechanism on the bottom and happily cut paper and taped up the packages to the tinkling sounds of the Dance of the Sugarplum Fairies from the Nutcracker Suite!

I actually enjoy wrapping gifts, do you?  I think it's the artist in me.

And now to some of the last wrapped gifts in my advent calendar.  Here is #18 - can you guess what is inside?

A pretty skein of the palest pink yarn.. I'm not sure how the black got in there.. LOL!

Apparently the German Shredder did not find this package appealing to rip up.. #19, this morning's surprise.

Ohhhh.. how totally wonderful.. some rustic hand-made oyster shell buttons!  I'm in love!  Alicia's choices for the box of goodies are just right up my alley.

One of the skeins Meeka did "open" is the one, far left, which is really wonderful, very colorful with a peach colored base, we rolled it up last night and I decided it would be fun to put as my next color.  

Yesterday I met my friend from high school, Toni, for lunch at Bocelli's Italian restaurant in Gresham.  Oh my goodness, did we have a wonderful time catching up on the latest family news of each other but also reminiscing of old times.  We talked about how she came to Hawaii to visit me and our other friend when we lived there right after graduating HS.  

She and I went to a Jimi Hendrix concert in Honolulu on October 5, 1968 at the Hawai'i International Center Arena - the poster below is from the concert.  It was an extremely memorable experience for us.  After the concert in the big auditorium, Jimi went across the street and jammed with a local band who was playing in the park.  While he was playing he looked up and went.. "Wow".. we all looked up and an eclipse of the moon was occurring.  Toni and I had to walk home in the middle of the night with several other people we did not know.  The good old days!

After hours of remembering the good old days we parted and I went across the street to a favorite antique mall of mine and looked around and enjoyed their holiday decorations. 

This vintage ornament wreath caught my eye and look at the old boxes of Shiny Brite decorations!

There were several things that caught my eye but nothing jumped into a bag to come home with me.

The display windows were eye-catching.

A big Mickey Mouse in a sleigh and a vintage Santa.

My son and his wife and their two boys brought their sweet Shelby out to the farm on Monday to lay to rest with their other three dogs and our cat Lucy up behind the pond.  A very sad day for all of us.  She was 15 years old.  The boys, at 9 and 10, had her with them since they were born.  Rest in Peace, dear "Roo".  

And so.. wishing you a good week on the run up to Christmas.  
((hugs)), Teresa :-)