December 30, 2010 9:48 p.m.

Dear friends, have you had a Merry Christmas so far?  We are already six days into the Twelve days of Christmas.

Our first day of Christmas, December 25th, was very nice.  We spent it at home, just the four of us, and then maintained our tradition of leaving the house in the late afternoon to visit the town of Celebration to enjoy Christmas dinner at the Columbia restaurant, a Spanish/Cuban restaurant that is well known in our state.

I sometimes feel I tell my stories best with photos, so that I shall do.

First up, we attended a very nice Christmas Eve service, a beautiful and peaceful candlelight service.  Sweet Girl had a bad cold and could not join her chorus during the service, so she sat with us.  Here we are in the narthex before much of the crowd arrived.

During the service, Chips, who is also in the chorus, had the distinct honor of being the one choral member who played choir chimes.  He was very excited about his duty of playing them before a congregation of some 1300 people, and he took the task seriously.  It is pretty much impossible to take pictures during the service, so you are going to have to take my word on this one.

Later that night, the children left behind their letters to Santa, including candy canes for him, his reindeer, and Mrs. Claus.  They also had several questions for him regarding the logistics of his annual trip around the world, for their belief in the jolly old elf is being subject to much logical scrutiny these days.  Questions like: How do you fit down the chimney?  Why is Rudolph’s nose red?  What do you really look like?  Draw a picture of yourself here on this paper.  Draw a picture of the elves and your workshop on this page.  You get the idea.

Fortunately, Santa was very patient about addressing all these questions and concerns, for the children had much to read and look at on Christmas morning.

For instance, they learned that Rudolphs’ nose is red because he is cold.  That Santa fits down the chimney because he isn’t as fat as everyone thinks.  That Santa was returning the candy canes we offered to Mrs. Claus because Mrs. Claus is on a diet this year.  You see, Santa is very good at appearing to answer your questions without really providing much real information.  Just like some people I know. 

The early morning calm before the chaos…

A critical inspection of the evidences left behind by Santa…

Notice that, in lieu of drawing pictures, Santa left behind official photographs of himself relaxing at home, of some of the lady elves who perform clerical tasks for him (like reading letters), and of his workshop (which, due to outsourcing, resembles more the warehouse of Amazon.com than it does the workshop of your imagining). 

In our home, Santa does not bring the big stuff.  He merely fills the Christmas stockings with unexpected small surprises.  Sometimes even including things that Mom and Dad wouldn’t normally choose, like silly bands.  Further proof of the true existence of Santa.  Just so you know how it is here.  I’ve heard he does things differently in other folks’ homes.

The children attacked the stockings first upon awakening. 

Then, Self-Reliant Man starts a fire in the fireplace.  It made for a perfect Christmassy atmosphere!

Next we had a true southern breakfast of biscuits and gravy, eggs and bacon.  Then we slowly and orderly opened gifts.  Some highlight gifts of interest to mention here include…….

……… an authentic imitation Charlie Brown Christmas tree (Self-Reliant Man concluded that the people in the Chinese factory that made this haven’t yet stopped laughing about it),

…………. a new and improved air rifle,

…….. a 20” girl’s bicycle,

a slot car set,

greeting card software and a coat (for me),

and a couple of different Nerf guns.

In the afternoon, we hit the road for dinner.  It was very pleasant, and the weather was nice, too.  Several people were even dining at the outdoor tables.

Here we are, though, inside.  I am always cold..

After dinner, we walked around the town and explored.  Sweet Girl had a cold, so we didn’t stay too late.

posing in front of the tree,

..and the lake,

.. and admiring a nativity display outside someone’s home.

watching the skaters (have you ever seen people skate on plastic? because that’s what this was!  I wouldn’t have thought it was possible)

and seeing the hourly snowfall.  Snowflakes falling in front of palm trees are an interesting study in contrast.

We also met up with traditional Christmas revellers.

All in all, it was a lovely Christmas Day.  This is a good thing, because the following days of the week included record cold temperatures, heavy winds, frozen pipes, chills, and sore throats.

But the miracle to keep in mind is that the Word became Flesh and dwelt among us.  That, truly, is AMAZING!!  Praise God.

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.... and that's what Christmas is all about, Charlie Brown!

December 23, 2010 10:46 p.m.

This evening, we went to see the Ultimate Christmas House.  It is an ordinary house, on an ordinary street, but the display is extraordinary!

  Check out these amazing photos, although, as the saying goes, you really had to be there.  Click on any photo to see a larger version.

This house has between 100,000 and 110,000 lights.

It runs an electric bill of $1000 over the course of a Christmas season.

This is the transformation of a garage into a full height diorama.

Everywhere on  the lawn were special things… like this ferris wheel……

….and this seesaw….

….. and here is a Christmas mailbox. 

It is a magnificent, free display!  They take three weeks to put it up every year, and then two more weeks to put it all away.  Every inch of the exterior walls of the house are covered with lights.

Here is part of another diorama inside a window, which includes a fiber optic Christmas tree and a Christmas train.

We have been out to see this house in past years.  It is always something to see, but this year we noticed even more lights and decorations.   Our visit there this evening was really cold!!!  I haven’t felt warm since we returned.  Fortunately for you, you get to see it in the comfort of your home.

We might not get any snow in Florida, but we certainly can make up for it in Christmas Spirit!

December 23, 2010 10:14 p.m.

… some folks choose to send out last minute Christmas cards,

some folks run out and get a few more gifts at the mall,

some folks stock up on the ingredients for their Christmas dinner,

some folks bake cookies.

While here at Breezy Point, we paint the porch and patio floor!  They looked so bad.  Now they look so good!  Our screened porch/breezeway now looks like this..

and our back patio now looks like this..

Finally, in order to ensure that the children did not venture prematurely out onto the porch floor, we posted warning signs.  Of course, we had to provide an air of authority so that the warning would be heeded.  Do you think this sign will be effective enough?

December 23, 2010 10:00 p.m.

Say what?

A few days ago, I posted about our trip to the Christmas tree farm; it might have been a surprise to some of you to know that such a place exists in Florida.

 

Well, another interesting thing is that the leaves have changed here, too.  In fact, this season has been so crisp, so early in the late fall/early winter season, that deciduous trees have indeed changed color! 

Yesterday, Sweet Girl and I got into the car and took a pleasant drive around our town to spot and photograph the leaf color. 

  

We even spotted an airplane in somebody’s back yard.  Only in our town!

December 21, 2010 8:24 p.m.

We have had plenty of Christmas activities to go around, and unfortunately I haven’t always remembered to bring along my camera.  But I shall share what I can.

First of all, it was a miserably cold week last week.  In fact, the entire month of December has had below average temperatures where we live, including maybe five nights where the temperatures reached or dipped below the freezing mark.  One night, we had a hard freeze for about nine hours.  We had to take in all our tangerines from the tree.  Our small tangerine tree provided about 90 tangerines this year!  We were able to give about half of them away to friends.  They turned out pretty good this year.

The next day, our homeschool fellowship group had planned a Christmas Caroling Hayride after dark.  Although this sounded like loads of fun, I just couldn’t face the possibility of the four of us freezing in a trailer with no chance of escaping into the warmth of a building until the caroling was over.  It was windy, and due to dip into the 20s that night, so we passed on this event.  You have to say “no” sometimes, right?

The next day, another homeschool fellowship group to which we belong had a visit to a local Christmas tree farm.  I’ll bet you wouldn’t have guessed that there is a Christmas tree farm in Central Florida, but there is, and we had a nice visit there.  We didn’t plan to get our tree there (not this year, anyway) but some of our friends did choose theirs, and cut it down.  We have never done this, so next year might be a first for us.  Don’t let me forget!  Anyway, here are some photos from that day..

Checking out the bunnies in the petting farm.

Sweet Girl got to ride a small horse.

Chips got to act goofy with his buddies.

They disappeared into this Christmas Maze for quite some time.

Sweet Girl got together with a group of girls and enjoyed staying lost in the maze, but I eventually found her.

It was a simple, enjoyable time for all of us.

The next day, our homeschool fellowship group had a lovely Girls’ Christmas Tea hosted at a member’s home.  Sweet Girl especially enjoyed getting dressed up for this.  One of the moms took our pictures.  I had forgotten my camera this day.

Unfortunately, Sweet Girl’s beautiful dress got injured after the tea – from playing on a scooter!  This really disappointed me, but we managed.  She no longer has a foot length dress , but rather, she has a dress with a shin length skirt now. .

Finally, on Sunday, our church put on their annual Christmas concert, a concert of traditional English carols and modern fantasies on these carols.  There was an orchestra and three choirs.  Our children did not participate in this concert; we relaxed in the audience, instead.  It was beautiful.  Got some photos of this, too, from another’s camera…

And this evening, we have some time to enjoy a crackling fire in our fireplace.  It has been a lovely Christmas Season so far.  What about yours?

What if Jesus had been born in the digital age?

It's universal. It's for everyone on the face of the earth. Nobody's excluded, no race, no tongue. So why in the world would anybody find this Gospel ---- this good news ---- offensive?

Who could be offended by a chance at a fresh start in life?

December 14, 2010 7:27 a.m.

I write this as our heat pump blows out the heat from the ceiling in emergency mode (should be called money burning mode) and our faucet drips water in order to prevent freezing from occurring.  It is showing 26 degrees and windy, with wind chills in mid-teens, here at Breezy Point.
The past two days, our children have gotten their annual dose of pop culture and commercialism as we decided on a mini-staycation,  to spend a night at a D*sney value hotel, and make use of their transportation in order to visit Downtown D*sney to shop, and also to walk around and see various sights on the property, including the lavish Christmas decorations inside several of the hotels.  We have something of a tradition of doing this during the Christmas season, with the children especially enjoying the monorail and ferry rides, and Self-Reliant Man and I especially enjoying our visits to the Gr*nd Floridi*n Hotel.  Please note that you can have a day or two of such activity without once entering the theme parks.  The transportation system is available to any hotel or campground guest, included in the price of the room, which for us, was just $80 after tax. 
So after church, we got there at our “value resort”, which was more than adequate for us (no complaints here).  My only complaint was having to wait 90 minutes on a check-in line.  That was not good, and I did learn that it could have been avoided if I had checked in online prior to our visit.  Live and learn is all I can say, and it did give me an opportunity to have a nice (long) chat with the mother of six in front of me who was visiting from Connecticut and had a rather major reason to complain about having to stand on that line (won’t go into the details, but it was a major case of lack of accountability on the part of D*sney).
Did I tell you yet that we froze our buns off during this D*sney visit?  But I digress.
We checked into our room and changed from our church clothes to the warmest clothing we had with us.  Turtleneck shirts layered with flannel shirts layered with fleeces layered with a heavy coat, etc.  We spent the afternoon and evening enjoying the festive atmosphere of Downtown D*sney.  We hung around into the early evening to see Miss O (Chips’ chamber trio coach of the previous three years)perform the electric violin as she does four times each evening during weekend nights at Downtown D*sney (and almost every night in December).  Afterward, she visited with us, between performances, and that was neat.
We eventually made our way to the monorail and visited the Contemporary and the Gr*nd Floridi*n Hotels, catching the M*gic Kingd*m fireworks show while at the GF, and stopping inside for hot chocolate and baked goods.  That hotel is really something, and we explained to our children that when they are adults who are rich and famous, they can give us a week there any time.
It was beginning to get rather chilly by the time we returned to our hotel, but the next morning proved to be a humdinger.
Any thought we might have had of renting a bicycle or a boat, playing mini-golf, or swimming, were dashed by day 2 when we exited the hotel.  It was freezing and windy as ever.  We donned heavy jackets, hats, scarves, and gloves and never once felt warm.  Folks who were visiting from northern climes, who had thrown a hoodie into their suitcase as an afterthought before heading to the airport, were in for a shock.  It didn’t get warmer as the day progressed – it got colder and windier, with the temps topping out at 46 windy degrees the entire day.  Pools everywhere were abandoned by guests, mini-golf courses had nary a car parked in their lots, water parks were shut down for the day, folks steered clear of the interactive water features in the shopping village, as they dashed outdoors from building to building.  The boardwalk resembled the New Jersey boardwalk in December, well, you get the idea.  It really felt Christmassy!
So we had a pleasant sit down breakfast at the F*rt Wilderness campground and thanked God that we had not chosen to camp there this year, as we usually do.  We also went to visit the horses and ponies at the stable there to see how they were doing.  They were well-tended-to for the weather, and the Shetland ponies tried their best to stay warm.  We had a few ferry boat runs to make, but the boats were, fortunately, enclosed.  It was a beautiful, sunny day.  Just freezing!












We definitely had a nice two days there, but this Mom was tired when we got home last night.