It's that time of the year again!
I'm very much in the Christmas spirit these days. Peire & I got our holiday cards written and mailed, and today we put up the Christmas tree, wrapped some gifts and decorated around the house. We also ordered our big holiday gift to ourselves -- a cherrywood dresser that matches the other pieces of our master bedroom suite. Now all we need to complete the set are a pair of end tables and maybe a low bookshelf...we'll see if that might be possible when we get our income tax refund back this next year.
We're breathing a big sigh of relief, too -- last Sunday was the event of the year at our workplace: the Commemorative Mass and new Visitor Center Grand Opening. We had the historic militia over from St. Augustine to fire off their cannons and black powder muskets, several Living History volunteers to help fill out the San Luis "community" feel, lots of kids doing a Las Posadas reenactment around the Plaza (this is a Hispanic tradition where children act out the saga of Mary & Joseph looking for accomodations in Bethlehem...only the Devil sneaks ahead of them and tries to persuade the various innkeepers to turn them away)...and then Bishop Ricard celebrated mass again in the Church reconstruction, and finally we had the big VC opening and reception and lots of grand festivity. My parents brought Rachel, and she was quite a hit of the party. I recruited a number of new potential volunteers and even got in contact with a few who had dropped away from MSL but wanted to come back. The VC itself is quite the posh place, too -- if you've not been out to Mission San Luis recently, I recommend that you do so in order to see the place. We're closed on Mondays, Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and New Year's Day...but otherwise we're open from 10am to 4pm!
For the first time in years, I'm finally going to have time off around Christmas, which will be great fun. I'll be getting together with my brother on Christmas Eve, and then we make the rounds of the parents' homes on Christmas Day. Peire & I always buy a new game each year, and this year we gave in and finally got "Settlers of Cataan". Nope, we didn't have it before, but we've got it now. We're also looking forward to the New Year's party at the home of georgie_bird -- primarily because of the neat "Six Wives of Henry VIII" version of Clue that she and her husband have created. We won't be able to stay until the wee hours because we need to get home to Rachel (and not keep my parents watching her all night), but we can still make our appearance.
And hey! I got a holiday snowflake from palmetto! I've never gotten any virtual gifts before -- thank you thank you!
We're breathing a big sigh of relief, too -- last Sunday was the event of the year at our workplace: the Commemorative Mass and new Visitor Center Grand Opening. We had the historic militia over from St. Augustine to fire off their cannons and black powder muskets, several Living History volunteers to help fill out the San Luis "community" feel, lots of kids doing a Las Posadas reenactment around the Plaza (this is a Hispanic tradition where children act out the saga of Mary & Joseph looking for accomodations in Bethlehem...only the Devil sneaks ahead of them and tries to persuade the various innkeepers to turn them away)...and then Bishop Ricard celebrated mass again in the Church reconstruction, and finally we had the big VC opening and reception and lots of grand festivity. My parents brought Rachel, and she was quite a hit of the party. I recruited a number of new potential volunteers and even got in contact with a few who had dropped away from MSL but wanted to come back. The VC itself is quite the posh place, too -- if you've not been out to Mission San Luis recently, I recommend that you do so in order to see the place. We're closed on Mondays, Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and New Year's Day...but otherwise we're open from 10am to 4pm!
For the first time in years, I'm finally going to have time off around Christmas, which will be great fun. I'll be getting together with my brother on Christmas Eve, and then we make the rounds of the parents' homes on Christmas Day. Peire & I always buy a new game each year, and this year we gave in and finally got "Settlers of Cataan". Nope, we didn't have it before, but we've got it now. We're also looking forward to the New Year's party at the home of georgie_bird -- primarily because of the neat "Six Wives of Henry VIII" version of Clue that she and her husband have created. We won't be able to stay until the wee hours because we need to get home to Rachel (and not keep my parents watching her all night), but we can still make our appearance.
And hey! I got a holiday snowflake from palmetto! I've never gotten any virtual gifts before -- thank you thank you!